US company agrees to fine for hiring children to clean slaughterhouses

US labor department announced that Fayette Janitorial Service agreed to $650,000 fine and mandate to no longer employ minors

A Tennessee-based sanitation company has agreed to pay more than half a million dollars after a federal investigation found it illegally hired at least two dozen children to clean dangerous meat processing facilities in Iowa and Virginia.

The US labor department announced on Monday that Fayette Janitorial Service LLC entered into a consent judgment, in which the company agrees to nearly $650,000 in civil penalties and the court-ordered mandate that it no longer employ minors. The February filing indicated federal investigators believed at least four children had still been working at one Iowa slaughterhouse as of 12 December.