The “Employee-Misconduct Defense” After An OSHA Citation

When safety violations are committed by employees, is the company liable? That depends, explains a client alert from Stites & Harbison. An OSHA field manual lays it out. There are four elements to the defense, all of them relating to workplace rules and how they were communicated and enforced. But one practical consideration trumps all of them: Good records must be kept. If there is no record of it, for purposes of the employee-misconduct defense, it never happened. One important benefit of laying the groundwork for the employee-misconduct defense is that it greatly reduces the chances of an infraction occurring in the first place.