Criminal charges added in Vecchio death

February 16 2010

Posted By FRANK DOBROVNIK, The Sault Star

City police have laid criminal charges in the death of public works employee James Vecchio at the city landfill last April.
Shortly after Ontario's Ministry of Labour confirmed it has laid six charges under the Occupational Health and Safety Act Thursday, the Sault Ste. Marie Police Service issued a statement that its 10-month investigation into the April 16 fatality is complete.
Vecchio, 34, was one of two city workers doing sewage work in an excavated hole when a mobile crane contracted by the city toppled in and crushed him. The father of two had been been employed by public works for three years.
Charged with criminal negligence causing death are: crane operator, Anthony Vanderloo, 56, of 1435 Third Line E., crane owner David Brian Selvers, 51, of 25 Broos Rd. and #1531147 Ontario Ltd., operating as Millennium Crane Rental of Sault Ste. Marie.
A first court appearance is scheduled for March 22.
Criminal negligence causing death is an indictable offence for which the maximum sentence is life in prison.
Millennium also faces five charges under the Occupational Health and Safety Act, including failing to ensure the crane operator was properly licensed. An unnamed employee is to appear in court on one charge.
The Sault Ste. Marie company's charges revolve around the "proper maintenance, operation and use of a crane," and the employee's about operating equipment "in a manner that might endanger himself or another individual," said ministry spokesperson Bruce Skeaff.
Preliminary results suggested the operator of the crane, which was loading concrete into the hole, backed up too far while repositioning.
A first court appearance is scheduled for March 10 in the Ontario Court of Justice provincial offences division.
It was the first fatality at the Fifth Line landfill since the city purchased it from a private contractor in the late 1980s.

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