Illegal activities of Southern Bosses during the week between Friday, February 13, and Friday, February 20
Every day across the south workers are killed on the job, stolen from, discriminated against, or sexually harassed. Sometimes the employers are caught. Here are a couple stories from last week:
Alabama Killers
A U.S. Department of Labor investigation found numerous safety hazards at a Mobile worksite where Construction Labor Services Inc. workers were exposed to sewage gases, resulting in two fatalities.
Investigators with the department’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration found that on Aug. 11, 2025, three Construction Labor Services workers were installing and repairing sewer lines inside of a manhole when they were overcome by sewer gas and became unresponsive. One worker regained consciousness and managed to self-rescue, and the two other workers succumbed to their injuries.
Federal safety investigators determined the employer lacked confined space entry programs, procedures, training, and emergency response plans, including plans to determine acceptable entry conditions for confined spaces.
OSHA cited Construction Labor Services Inc. with 16 serious violations and proposed penalties of $257,707.
Tennessee Discriminators
StoneMor, Inc., a cemetery and funeral management company, violated federal law when it discriminated against black employees, and retaliated against a supervisor after failing to stop complaints about racial discrimination, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) charged in a lawsuit.
According to the EEOC’s lawsuit, StoneMor managers at a Memphis location restricted all black employees from a breakroom while allowing access to white employees. The company also fired a burial supervisor in May 2022 after a member of his crew complained about similar racial discrimination to the corporate headquarters and threatened to complain to the EEOC. StoneMor managers initially directed the supervisor to restrain his staffer from filing those complaints, threatening him with discharge if he failed, the suit said.
“Segregating employees by race and pressuring supervisors to silence discrimination complaints strike at the core of federal civil rights law,” said Catherine Eschbach, acting EEOC General Counsel. “The EEOC will continue to hold employers accountable when they attempt to enforce discriminatory practices or retaliate against those who stand up for equal treatment in the workplace.”
Such alleged conduct violates Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibits employers from discriminating against any individual because of race and from retaliating against an employee because he or she opposed unlawful discrimination. The EEOC filed suit in U.S. District Court for the Western District of Tennessee, after first attempting to reach a pre-litigation settlement through its administrative conciliation process.