A San Francisco-based construction company, a foreman, a project manager and a safety supervisor have been charged with involuntary manslaughter for a fatal trench collapse in 2023, according to the city’s district attorney.
District Attorney Brooke Jenkins announced on October 19 that D’Arcy & Harty Construction Inc. of San Francisco and the following have been charged with one count each of involuntary manslaughter and four counts of “violation of a safety standard resulting in death of an employee”:
- John Finbarr Darcy, 62, of San Francisco, the company’s designated site safety representative.
- John William Tobin, 39, of San Francisco, project manager.
- Filiberto Poblano Perez, 52, of Richmond, crew foreman directly supervising Romero.
Javier Romero, 24, of Alameda County was in an 8-foot-deep trench September 28, 2023, working on a sewer tunnel rehabilitation for the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission.
An un-shored section of the trench underneath a sidewalk collapsed after a vehicle passed by, burying Romero under sandy, granular dirt and concrete debris.
There was shoring and sheeting on two sides of the trench, but Cal/OSHA said it was inadequate and improperly installed. The other two sides, including the one that collapsed, had no cave-in protection.
The San Francisco Fire Department responded with more than 50 firefighters. Dogs were used to locate the area where Romero was buried, and firefighters systematically worked to recover the body through an opening in the sidewalk. Romero’s body was recovered about 2 hours later. He died of mechanical asphyxia.
Powered byHis employer, D’Arcy & Harty Construction, was cited for two willful violations for failure to provide adequate cave-in protection and not providing a safe way to escape the trench. The company was also fined $371,100.
The company had been cited with the same violations less than three weeks earlier, on September 11, 2023, on a different site and had to fix the safety violations before it could resume work, according to Cal/OSHA. D’Arcy & Harty Construction was fined $5,465 for those earlier violations, which it contested.
D’Arcy & Harty Construction was also cited with six other violations in the September 28, 2023, fatal collapse, including serious violations for failure to conduct daily safety inspections of the trench before an employee entered, and failure to properly use equipment and materials to prevent employee exposure to trenching hazards.
The company, along with Darcy and Perez, have been arraigned and each pleaded not guilty to all charges, according to the D.A.
The two men were released on the conditions they surrender their passports, stay in California unless given permission by the court to leave, “not supervise employees or act in any capacity governing safety on a construction jobsite,” and not communicate with witnesses or each other.
The D.A. Office says the investigation of the incident continues.
Criminal charges are not common in trench collapses, with at most a few a year. Safety advocates have called for criminal charges in more cases, arguing that such incidents are preventable if required trench boxes are used.
