Katherine Maxwell, Scott Maxwell in court for workplace health and safety breach

Two pineapple farmers on the Fraser Coast have been fined a total of $75,000 after being found guilty of failing to comply with workplace health and safety after a young worker was run over by a harvester.

Caleb Mead, 20, pictured, told the court he had been working on the Maxwells’ farm when the incident happened on August 1, 2022, when he was picking pineapples with other workers.

The owners of a Tinana pineapple farm have been fined a total of $75,000 after being found guilty of failing to comply with workplace health and safety when a young worker was seriously injured after being run over by a harvester.

Katherine Anne Maxwell, Scott Evans Maxwell and their company Scocan Holdings Pty Ltd, pleaded not guilty to failing to comply with health and safety duty category 2 in Maryborough Magistrates Court on Thursday.

But they were found guilty of the offence by Magistrate John Milburn after a trial in which the pineapple picker testified.

Caleb Mead, 20, told the court he had been working on the Maxwells’ farm when the incident happened on August 1, 2022, when he was picking pineapples with other workers.

He had been working on the farm for about eight months.

The injured worker, Caleb Mead, 20, testified during the farmers’ trial, which was held before Magistrate John Milburn.

Mr Mead said he remembered getting on the trailer, also known as a harvester, which had a few crates filled with pineapples on it, about 11am.

He said he sat under the conveyor belt, also known by workers as the “boom” on the right side of the trailer, with his legs dangling over the side of the trailer when the incident happened.

“It just like flashed to me being under the tyre,” he said, telling the court he felt something had caught his leg before he was pulled under the tyre and he remembered saying “oh my God, oh my God”.

Mr Mead, who gave a statement to investigators after the incident and drew a diagram to show where he had been sitting, claimed in court he had not been told anything in relation to where he was sitting under the conveyor belt, and had seen others sit there before.

He said sat on the trailer every day as it was towed around the farm, he said.

Mr Mead did however say he had completed an induction before he started working on the farm, was given safety directions about using a trailer that was used to transport workers around the farm and was told to make sure it was safe and to “not do anything stupid on it”.

The distances travelled on the trailer were not great, the court heard, and the trailer was towed a few hundred metres from one pineapple patch to another at speeds of 5-9km/h.

Under cross examination it was put to Mr Mead that another worker had told him not to sit under the boom, but he rejected this.

It was also put to him that he had been told by Ms Maxwell not to dangle his legs over the side of the trailer, which he also denied.

A statement given by Mr Mead to an investigator after the incident was then read to him.

In the statement, Mr Mead said he had been told by Ms Maxwell to “sit where you can and not to have our legs dangling”.

Mr Mead accepted he had said that in his statement.

It was also put to Mr Mead that Ms Maxwell had told him not to sit underneath the boom and Mr Mead said he had forgotten about that.

Caleb Mead, 20, pictured, told the court he had been working on the Maxwells’ farm when the incident happened on August 1, 2022, when he was picking pineapples with other workers.

Mr Mead was asked what he was doing when the trailer was moving, and it was put to him he had done something described as a “galloping motion”.

In a signed statement made to a safety investigator in December 2022, the court heard, Mr Mead had said “simply to amuse myself I was lifting my feet up and down in the dirt, similar to a galloping-type motion”.

Mr Mead told the court he disagreed with the written statement, and he believed his words were “a bit jumbled up or misunderstood”.

“I had just recently had a tube removed from my throat, I could barely just speak to people,” Mr Mead said.

He also denied he said those words to the investigator but said he had been asked a question and he said yes.

Mr Mead denied he had ever said the word “galloping”.

Several other workers testified about being present during the incident, with the court hearing no one else had been injured before while sitting on the trailer.

A safety investigator also testified during the trial.

Scocan Holdings Pty Ltd was fined $65,000 over the incident, with each of the Maxwells fined $5000.

No conviction was recorded.

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