The U.S. Department of Labor has found a second sanitation contractor at the Seaboard Triumph Foods LLC facility that employed children to perform dangerous work during overnight shifts at its Sioux City pork processing plant.

Under a consent order and judgment, approved by the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Iowa on Nov. 27, 2024, Qvest LLC must pay $171,919 in child labor civil money penalties, hire a third-party to review and implement company policies to prevent the employment of children in violation of the Fair Labor Standards Act and establish a process for reporting concerns about the illegal employment of children.

The judgment follows an investigation by the department’s Wage and Hour Division that found the Guymon, Oklahoma, sanitation contractor employed 11 children to use corrosive cleaners to clean head splitters, jaw pullers, bandsaws, neck clippers and other equipment at the Seaboard Triumph Foods facility from at least September 2019 through September 2023.

Seaboard Triumph Foods contracted Fayette Janitorial Service LLC in September 2023 for sanitation work at its facility. In May 2024, the department entered into a consent order and judgment with Fayette after division investigators found the Somerville, Tennessee, contractor employed nine children illegally at the Sioux City pork processing facility. After Fayette took over the plant’s sanitation services contract, Fayette rehired some of the children previously employed by Qvest.

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In a statement, Seaboard Triumph Foods noted the legal filings against Qvest Sanitation by the DOL do not include any claims against STF. STF did not employ any of the alleged individuals and has no evidence that any underage individuals accessed the plant. In addition, the vendor, who had express contractual requirements to follow all labor laws, has not been present at the STF facility for more than a year, as the company’s sanitation needs are currently supported through an ongoing partnership with the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union.

“This situation underscores the problems facing employers throughout the country: individuals, including minors, obtaining jobs through their use of fraudulent identification documents, which are sophisticated enough to fool even the federal government’s E-Verify system. Businesses are victimized by this fraud,” notes Paul DeCamp, the former head of the Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division, and counsel for STF.

The company said safety, ethical practices, and compliance with regulations and industry standards are of paramount importance to STF, and expects the same from vendors and partners. "We will not tolerate any vendor’s use of underage labor within our facility, and will also take measures to prevent fraud against our company."

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Federal law forbids children under age 18 from being employed in dangerous jobs common in meat and poultry slaughtering, processing, rendering and packing operations.

“The U.S. Department of Labor is determined to end the illegal employment of children in our nation’s workplaces,” said Regional Solicitor Christine Z. Heri. “We are committed to using all strategies to stop and prevent unlawful child labor and holding all employers legally responsible for their actions. Children should never be hired to perform dangerous and prohibited tasks.”

In addition to the payment of penalties for the child labor violations, the consent order and judgment requires Qvest to do the following:

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In fiscal year 2024, the division concluded 736 investigations uncovering child labor violations that affected 4,030 children, and assessed employers more than $15.1 million in penalties for violating federal child labor laws, an 89 percent increase since 2023.