The owner of the Tennessee plastics factory where workers were swept away by Hurricane Helene won't face charges
The investigation found no evidence that Impact Plastics employees were told they could not leave the factory or that they would be fired if they left, according to a news release from the district attorney. It also found employees had a little more than an hour during which they could have evacuated from the Erwin, Tennessee, industrial park. The conclusion mirrors that of a similar investigation by the Tennessee Occupational Safety and Health Administration that found in April that workers had time to evacuate the premises, albeit by makeshift routes.
A statement from Impact Plastics attorney Stephen Ross Johnson on Friday said company president and founder Gerald O'Connor welcomes the results of the TBI investigation.
'The true and accurate facts are now known,' the statement reads.
Five employees and one contractor who cleaned the offices once a week were killed on September 27 after they were washed away by floodwaters. They were among 12 people who stuck close to the Impact Plastics building, waiting for the water to recede, after realizing the exit road was already submerged. When the water kept rising, they climbed onto the bed of a semitrailer loaded with giant spools of plastic piping that was parked outside the factory. When floodwaters eventually overwhelmed the truck, six people were able to use the piping for flotation and were later rescued. The other six drowned.
The TOSHA report notes that several Impact Plastics employees did escape the flood. Some were able to drive or walk over an embankment to a nearby highway after workers at a neighboring business dismantled a fence there. Others escaped by driving over a makeshift path onto nearby railroad tracks that an employee at a neighboring business created with a tractor. Still others were able to escape by walking to the railroad tracks, according to that report.
Although the criminal case is being closed, the company still faces a wrongful death lawsuit from the family of Johnny Peterson, and other civil suits are planned.
Attorney Luke Widener, who represents the families of several flood victims, said in a statement that they 'categorically disagree that Impact Plastics employees were given any meaningful opportunity to escape. …Indeed, if Impact Plastics' account were true, Bertha Mendoza, Sibrina Barnett, and the others who perished would still be with us.'
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
23 minutes ago
- Yahoo
House ending session early as Republican clash over Epstein vote
The Daily Beast House Speaker Mike Johnson is trying to spare Donald Trump from another Jeffrey Epstein headache—at least for now. As uproar from the MAGA base continues, the GOP leader said there will be no vote on any measure related to the so-called 'Epstein files' before lawmakers head off on Thursday for summer break until September. Johnson insisted there's 'no daylight' between House Republicans and the president, citing Trump's call last week for the Justice Department to make public grand jury testimon
Fox News
23 minutes ago
- Fox News
Trump calls for Obama to be criminally investigated, says he was Russiagate 'ringleader'
NEW You can now listen to Fox News articles! President Donald Trump claimed that former President Barack Obama was the "ringleader" of Russiagate, calling for him to be criminally investigated amid new claims that members of his administration allegedly "manufactured" intelligence that prompted the Trump–Russia collusion narrative. Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard recently declassified documents revealing "overwhelming evidence" that claimed that after Trump won the 2016 election against Hillary Clinton, then-President Obama and his national security team allegedly laid the groundwork for what would be the yearslong Trump–Russia collusion probe. OBAMA ADMIN 'MANUFACTURED' INTELLIGENCE TO CREATE 2016 RUSSIAN ELECTION INTERFERENCE NARRATIVE, DOCUMENTS SHOW Gabbard said the documents revealed that Obama administration officials "manufactured and politicized intelligence" to allegedly create the narrative that Russia was attempting to influence the 2016 presidential election, despite information from the intelligence community stating otherwise. The new documents name Obama, top officials on his National Security Council, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, CIA Director John Brennan, national security advisor Susan Rice, Secretary of State John Kerry, Attorney General Loretta Lynch and Deputy FBI Director Andrew McCabe, among others. Gabbard, on Monday, sent a criminal referral to the Justice Department related to those findings. Department of Justice officials did not share further details on whom the criminal referral was for. OBAMA OFFICIALS USED DOSSIER TO PROBE, BRIEF TRUMP DESPITE KNOWING IT WAS UNVERIFIED 'INTERNET RUMOR' As for Gabbard's criminal referral, Trump was asked which specific figures should be under criminal investigation, to which he replied: "President Obama. He started it." "And Biden was there with him, and Comey was there, and Clapper, the whole group was there. Brennan. They were all there in the room right here. This is the room," Trump said from the Oval Office Tuesday during a meeting with the president of the Philippines. "It was President Obama. It was lots of people all over the place." None of the former Obama-era officials have responded to Fox News Digital's request for comment. The president went on to say that his administration has "all of the documents, and from what Tulsi told me, she's got thousands of additional documents coming." "So President Obama, it was his concept – his idea," Trump said Tuesday. "But he also got it from crooked Hillary Clinton – crooked as a $3 bill, and Hillary Clinton and her group, the Democrats, spent $12 million to Christopher Steele to write up a report that was a total fake report." Steele authored the discredited anti-Trump dossier, which was paid for by the Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee through law firm Perkins Coie. The anti-Trump dossier served as the basis for Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrants against former Trump campaign aide Carter Page. The intelligence community, at the time, widely viewed the dossier as "internet rumor," but top officials, like Comey, McCabe and Brennan, reportedly pushed for its inclusion in the 2017 Intelligence Community Assessment. "It took two years to figure that out, but it came out that it was a total fake report – it was made-up fiction – and they used that," Trump said. "The Steele report was a disaster – all lies, all fabrication, all admitted fraud." Meanwhile, Trump said "we caught Hillary Clinton, we got Barack Hussein Obama. They're the ones. And then you have many, many people under them. Susan Rice – they're all the names." OBAMA OFFICIALS ADMITTED THEY HAD NO 'EMPIRICAL EVIDENCE' OF TRUMP-RUSSIA COLLUSION: HOUSE INTEL TRANSCRIPTS "I guess they figured they're going to put this in as classified information and nobody will ever see it again – but it doesn't work that way," Trump said. "It is the most unbelievable thing I think I've ever read." Trump added: "Never has a thing like this happened in the history of our country." On July 28, 2016, Brennan briefed President Obama on a plan from one of Clinton's campaign foreign policy advisors "to vilify Donald Trump by stirring up a scandal claiming interference by the Russian security service," meeting notes said. FBI LAUNCHES CRIMINAL INVESTIGATIONS OF JOHN BRENNAN, JAMES COMEY: DOJ SOURCES "We're getting additional insight into Russian activities from (REDACTED)," read Brennan's handwritten notes, exclusively obtained by Fox News Digital in October 2020. "CITE (summarizing) alleged approved by Hillary Clinton a proposal from one of her foreign policy advisers to vilify Donald Trump by stirring up a scandal claiming interference by the Russian security service." After that briefing, the CIA properly forwarded that information through a Counterintelligence Operational Lead (CIOL) to Comey and Deputy Assistant Director of Counterintelligence Peter Strzok, with the subject line: "Crossfire Hurricane." CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP Former Special Counsel Robert Mueller was appointed to take over the FBI's original "Crossfire Hurricane" investigation. After nearly two years, Mueller's investigation, which concluded in March 2019, yielded no evidence of criminal conspiracy or coordination between the Trump campaign and Russian officials during the 2016 presidential election. Shortly after, John Durham was appointed as special counsel to investigate the origins of the "Crossfire Hurricane" probe. Durham found that the FBI "failed to act" on a "clear warning sign" that the bureau was the "target" of a Clinton-led effort to "manipulate or influence the law enforcement process for political purposes" ahead of the 2016 presidential election. Comey and Brennan are currently under criminal investigation, launched by FBI Director Kash Patel.
New York Times
24 minutes ago
- New York Times
Judges Ask Justice Dept. to Submit Epstein Case Transcripts With Proposed Redactions
Two federal judges in Manhattan said in similar court orders on Tuesday that they would try to 'expeditiously' resolve motions by Attorney General Pam Bondi seeking to unseal grand jury transcripts from the prosecutions of Jeffrey Epstein and his co-conspirator, Ghislaine Maxwell. But both judges ordered the government to file legal arguments setting out the 'special circumstances' that would justify disclosing the materials, which are shielded by grand jury secrecy. The judges ordered the government to submit two complete sets of grand jury transcripts from the cases, one without redactions and one with them made in the form that the government proposed to make public. The government should also cite any other grand jury materials, like exhibits that were shown to the grand jury, the judges' orders said. The orders come in response to motions Ms. Bondi filed on Friday as President Trump has sought to quell criticism from many of his supporters who want more information on what the government knows about Mr. Epstein's activities and any prominent figures who were in his circle. The judges handling Ms. Bondi's motions are Richard M. Berman, who oversaw Mr. Epstein's case before he was found dead in his cell in 2019, a death that was ruled a suicide; and Paul A. Engelmayer, who was recently assigned to the case of Ms. Maxwell, who was convicted in 2021 of sex trafficking and sentenced to 20 years in prison. (The original judge in Ms. Maxwell's case, Alison J. Nathan, was later appointed to the Second Circuit appeals court in Manhattan.) Judge Berman set Aug. 5 as a deadline for any letter to be submitted setting out a position on the proposed disclosure on behalf of Mr. Epstein. Judge Engelmayer set a similar deadline for Ms. Maxwell to inform the court of her position on the proposed release of records. The judges also set the same date as a deadline for victims of the sex-trafficking scheme to share their positions on the government's request. The judges made it clear there were potential privacy issues involved in releasing the records. Judge Berman wrote, quoting from a memo by the Justice Department and the F.B.I. summarizing a review of records in the Epstein case, that according to the government, 'Epstein harmed over one thousand victims. Each suffered unique trauma. Sensitive information related to these victims is intertwined throughout the materials."
