Amazon must turn over ergonomic data in labor department safety issue probe

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Amazon safety investigation overview:

• Who: A judge has ordered Amazon.com to turn over ergonomic data and set other deadlines for compliance in an OSHA safety probe.
• Why: OSHA is investigating concerns that some Amazon warehouse employees may have been exposed to serious ergonomic hazards.
• Where: The Amazon safety lawsuit was filed in Washington federal court.

A Washington federal judge has ordered Amazon.com to release ergonomic data to the U.S. Department of Labor as part of its investigation into Amazon safety issues at its warehouses, Law360 reports.

On Jan. 30, U.S. Magistrate Judge Michelle L. Peterson ordered Amazon to provide metadata logs of ergonomic hazard assessments by Friday. These logs were subpoenaed by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) to help them find out if there are serious ergonomic hazards at six Amazon warehouses.

OSHA investigating whether Amazon safety and ergonomics data has been concealed

OSHA issued the Amazon data subpoenas last summer after it received complaints about working conditions in Amazon warehouses. At the Jan. 30 hearing, Judge Peterson noted that Amazon did not initially comply with the subpoena demands for several months.

“It looks like it took Amazon a little bit of time to take this seriously and to ramp up production,” the judge said.

In addition to the metadata logs, OSHA is also seeking documents from five Amazon directors and managers by March.

Judge Peterson ordered Amazon to complete its review of electronically stored data for seven custodians of the record, to complete privilege logs for subpoenaed documents, and to complete depositions of company officials and witnesses by June 30.

The OSHA investigation involves concerns that Amazon warehouse workers are exposed to significant ergonomic hazards in the workplace.

Amazon is also under investigation by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York into concerns the e-commerce giant may have concealed the number of workers injured at Amazon warehouses or made false statements to lenders about its safety records.

Amazon was recently hit with a class action lawsuit alleging it improperly collected, used, and stored employees’ biometric data during COVID screenings.

Have you worked in an Amazon warehouse? Tell us what you think of the Amazon safety investigation in the comments!

The Department of Labor is represented by Dominika Tarczynska, Jacob Lillywhite, and Adam Gitlin of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York and Nicholas W. Brown of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Western District of Washington.

The Amazon safety case is Amazon.com Services LLC v. Department of Labor, et al., Case No. 2:22-cv-01815, in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington.

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