Hastings’ Progressive Meats fails to overturn conviction for teen worker Alesana Baker’s mangled hand

A meat processing company has lost its bid to overturn a conviction for a “horrific” workplace accident which cost it a $280,000 fine and ended an injured worker’s hopes of a sporting career overseas.

The Hastings company Progressive Meats Ltd also had to pay its former worker, Alesana Baker, $48,000 for consequential loss and emotional harm after his right hand was severely injured by a brisket cutter at its works on October 15, 2020.

At the time, Baker was 17 years old and had just left school. Surgeons repaired part of his hand but the top joint of his right thumb was amputated.

The health and safety regulator WorkSafe said it was a “horrific” injury and prosecuted the company for failing to ensure the health and safety of workers.

The prosecution, under the Health and Safety at Work Act 2015, failed in two of the three particulars under which WorkSafe laid its charge.

The charge alleged that Progressive Meats failed to provide and maintain adequate systems and processes to identify and manage hazards.

It also alleged that it failed to ensure the brisket cutter was safe to use, and that its two-handed controls could not be bypassed.

After a five-day trial in the Hastings District Court in December 2022, Judge Geoff Rea rejected both those grounds.

However, he convicted Progressive Meats on a third ground - that it had not ensured adequate instruction, monitoring and supervision of workers.

The brisket cutter was like a very large mechanical pair of shears, cutting through bone and flesh of a lamb carcass.

Baker was using it one-handed when it cut into his thumb and three fingers of his right hand.

Judge Rea found that the company failed to ensure Baker received adequate training in dealing with potentially dangerous equipment.

Progressive Meats challenged the judge’s decision, saying the judge had erred in finding that it had failed to train Baker correctly to use the brisket cutter – that is, with two hands.

It said the evidence before the court did not prove the charge to the required criminal standard. The judge’s decision, it said, was a “miscarriage of justice”.

It said the finding also contradicted other findings regarding the company’s “robust safety systems”, and its lack of knowledge that the brisket cutter could be operated with one hand.

Progressive Meats appealed the conviction to the High Court at Napier.

In that court, Justice Christine Grice turned down the company’s appeal.

“I am satisfied the judge made no error in finding that, although the appellant’s systems and processes were robust, the implementation of the workplaces policies and procedures on the ground were inadequate in this case,” Justice Grice said.

“I do not accept that the judge’s findings were contradictory in the way that the appellant alleges, and accordingly this ground must fail.”

In a victim impact statement at Progressive Meats’ sentencing, Baker said he had played volleyball throughout high school.

He had secured a scholarship to play university volleyball in the United States, and was injured four weeks before he was due to fly out to Los Angeles.

“I had that dream for so long and felt it was snatched away from me,” the statement said.

“It is so frustrating to have a hand that no longer works properly, especially as I am only 20 years old.”

A plastic surgeon at Waikato Hospital successfully repaired tendons, nerves and blood vessels supplying Baker’s fingers but the thumb tip could not be saved.

Ric Stevens spent many years working for the former New Zealand Press Association news agency, including as a political reporter at Parliament, before holding senior positions at various daily newspapers. He joined NZME’s Open Justice team in 2022 and is based in Hawke’s Bay.