DAKOTA, Illinois — The Occupational Safety and Health Administration opened investigations into two companies earlier this week after the death of an Illinois man in a forklift accident at Berner Food & Beverage.

Marc Merriman, 45, Loves Park, was killed when he accidentally drove his forklift off a loading dock at the Dakota factory at about 3:45 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 27, according to the Stephenson County Sheriff’s Office.

OSHA has opened inspections into his employer, Trilogy Warehouse Partners II, LLC, and the Rockford staffing agency that provided him, Aerotek.

The federal agency has six months to complete the inspections, said Scott Allen, a Department of Labor spokesperson out of the Chicago office.

An OSHA database shows numerous safety inspections or violations related to Aerotek, which has locations internationally as well as around the U.S.

The database shows no history of investigations into Trilogy, which is based in Missouri.

Ed Wood, VP of Human Resources at Berner, said Trilogy is a third-party logistics partner, known in the manufacturing industry as a “3PL.”

“Companies hire 3PLs to do their warehousing and distribution, so they handle all the logistics,” he said.

Wood issued a statement from Berner regarding Merriman’s death.

“This past weekend, a contractor was involved in a fatal accident involving the navigation of his forklift at our facility. Our thoughts and prayers are with his family and all those impacted by this tragic event,” it stated.

“While our company has an excellent safety record and has never experienced such a tragedy until this incident, we are conducting a thorough investigation and cooperating with the outside investigations.”

Wood said he could not provide additional details given the ongoing investigation.

This is not the first time within the past year that OSHA has been called in to investigate an accident at the Berner factory, which is located at 2034 E. Factory Rd., about five miles south of the Illinois/Wisconsin border. It produces shelf-stable dips, sauces, aerosol cheese and milk-based beverages.

OSHA records show Berner paid $13,000 in penalties earlier this year after an accident at the factory last October resulted in an employee suffering an amputation. OSHA initially fined Berner a total of $18,944 for two violations of safety standards, but this amount was reduced in a settlement conference.

On Oct. 17, 2018, employees “unjamming” frozen product from a condiment pump “were exposed to amputation and laceration hazards from contact with the pump’s impeller blades,” according to the OSHA citation document.

The document does not specify what was amputated but it states employees “inserted fingers into the outflow opening of the pump in an effort to clear the jammed product.”

The pump should have been turned off, or an alternative protection such as machine guarding used.

OSHA inspectors found that Berner failed to provide specific training on energy controls, and as a result, “employees did not all know when the pump should be de-energized and locked out when removing various pipe sections for cleaning and unjamming tasks.”

OSHA completed its investigation into the amputation accident in April.

Within a month, Berner had paid its penalties and met all requirements to fix the issues, according to OSHA. The case was closed in May.

In the wake of the fatal accident this week at Berner, several former employees commented publicly on social media with concerns about safety at the factory.

One former employee, Travis Wilson, a 41-year-old Freeport resident, said he was fired after he brought his concerns to a safety supervisor.

Reached by phone, Wilson said he worked at the Berner factory from 2013 until he was walked out the door on a Friday in December 2017, hours after he told a safety supervisor doing a walkthrough that he worried about safety issues such as machinery not being properly shut down.

“She was kind of caught off guard,” Wilson said. “She said, ‘Oh, well, that’s something we’re going to have to work on.’ ... I personally think (she) had her hands tied.”

Wilson said he was fired for insubordination and attendance issues, but he said any days of work he missed were related to bone spurs and arthritis he suffered after two falls on the job at Berner. After his firing, he filed a complaint with OSHA which he said resulted in a directive to improve conditions, not a violation.

He said he has no faith that conditions have improved since then.

Still, he misses his job at Berner. It was hard, hot work in 12-hour shifts, with only two 15-minute breaks and a 20-minute lunch, starting at $10/hour — but it was fulfilling, and by the end he was making $16.41/hour, he said.

“I really enjoyed my job. You’re operating million-dollar machines. It was a very fun learning experience,” he said.

During his time at the Dakota factory, Berner completed a $70 million expansion that tripled the size of the facility. The Rockford Register Star reported last year that Berner broke ground in September 2018 on a $25 million-warehouse and distribution center outside Rockford.