Element Three of the Unpreventable Employee Misconduct Defense: Insistence on Compliance and Established Methods of Discovering Violations, Despite Not Knowing About the Subject Violation

In part three of this four-part series addressing the “Unpreventable Employee Misconduct” defense, we will examine the third element an employer must prove to successfully defend against an OSHA citation: that the employer insisted on compliance and had methods of discovering violations of its rules, even though it did not know about the specific violation. Similar to all other elements of this defense, the concept is relatively simple: the employer must insist on safety compliance and have established methods for discovering violations of OSHA violations,…
Continue reading...

Unpreventable Employee Misconduct: Defending Your Company when there is No Defense to the Conduct

What if one or your workers – who should and does know better – violates an OSHA standard?  Shouldn’t an employer be able to defend itself from the violation even when there is no dispute that the underlying conduct occurred? The answer is yes, provided the four elements of the “unpreventable employee misconduct” defense are met. Unpreventable employee misconduct, an affirmative defense, is often raised by employers in OSHA enforcement actions. Thus, while OSHA bears the burden of proving a violation, the employer bears the…
Continue reading...