Victim was helping clear debris from site of 3-storey duplex
A demolition job supervisor was charged with Occupational Health and Safety Act violations more than one year after his friend died at a site in Ottawa.
The incident happened on May 3, 2018, when supervisor Cory Peters invited his 47-year-old friend Tracey Anne Millsop and her husband Fonze Latourelle to the site he was supervising to help him clean debris from the demolition of a three-story duplex.
While at the site, Millsop fell through an open gap between joists on the floor. The sheathing on the first floor had been removed and there was a makeshift pathway built with wooden planks. The planks were of different lengths and placed overlapped, which left openings on the floor.
Millsop remained conscious and refused to be brought to the hospital, according to media reports. When she lost consciousness while her husband was driving her home, Latourelle brought her to the hospital, where she later died due to her ribs puncturing her liver as a result of her fall.
Peters was charged under the Ontario’s OHSA for failing to ensure a protective covering over the open work surface. He is expected to plead guilty to the non-criminal charge in 2020.
“My client, Mr. Peters, feels horribly about the entire situation and the loss of his friend. He is expected to take full responsibility,” said defence lawyer Joshua Clarke.
