Corporate Misconduct Accountability Project — EvilCorporations.com
Worker Death · Equipment Safety
Cincinnati Incorporated Sold a Machine That Crushed a Worker to Death
A laser-cutting system with a known fatal pinch point, no emergency stop, and no safety mat. Luis Prieto paid with his life.
● Critical Severity
TL;DR
Cincinnati Incorporated designed, sold, and maintained a laser-cutting system that contained a fatal pinch point. The machine had no emergency stop button accessible from the danger zone and no pressure-sensitive safety mat that would halt the system when someone stood in its path. A worker named Luis Prieto was crushed by a descending steel beam in 2018 and died from his injuries. A federal appeals court ruled in 2026 that the design defect case must go to a jury, reversing a lower court dismissal. Cincinnati had multiple opportunities to prevent this death and chose not to act.
Demand that manufacturers of industrial machinery be held fully accountable when their design choices kill workers.
1
Worker Killed
90 min
Prieto trapped before extrication
~2000
Year the unsafe machine was sold
2018
Year Prieto was killed
2026
Year appeals court reversed dismissal
0
Emergency stops accessible from pinch point
⚠️ Core Allegations
Core Allegations
What Cincinnati Incorporated did
| 01 | Cincinnati Incorporated designed, sold, installed, and maintained a laser-cutting system that contained a fatal pinch point: a narrow gap where a descending steel beam could crush anyone standing inside. | High |
| 02 | The system was designed without an emergency stop (E-stop) button accessible from the pinch point, meaning a worker trapped inside had no way to halt the machine. | High |
| 03 | The system was designed without a safety mat, a pressure-sensitive device that would automatically stop the machine when someone stood in the danger zone. | High |
| 04 | The estate’s expert testified that if Cincinnati had installed a safety mat, Luis Prieto would be alive today. | High |
| 05 | On July 12, 2018, Prieto was in the gap when his coworker activated the system. The steel beam descended and crushed Prieto’s mid-section. Emergency responders took approximately 90 minutes to extricate him. He died shortly afterward. | High |
| 06 | There were work-related reasons for operators to enter the gap: metal scraps would periodically fall and needed to be cleared. Cincinnati designed a machine that required workers to enter a death trap as part of routine operation. | High |
Corporate Accountability Failures
How Cincinnati avoided responsibility
| 01 | Cincinnati’s maintenance employee Jose Nunez visited the facility repeatedly after installation and never reported to InMetal that the wall-side safety barrier had gone missing, leaving workers exposed to the pinch point without their employer knowing. | High |
| 02 | Cincinnati argued in court that equipping the machine with an emergency stop and a safety mat might actually make it more dangerous by encouraging workers to enter the gap. This argument attempts to use worker safety features as a justification for removing them. | High |
| 03 | Cincinnati successfully obtained a full dismissal at the district court level, nearly avoiding accountability entirely for a design that killed a worker. The First Circuit reversed this on the design claims in 2026. | Medium |
| 04 | Cincinnati attempted to blame the worker for his own death, characterizing Prieto’s presence in the pinch point as “playing games” without acknowledging the documented work-related reasons for entering the gap. | High |
Worker Safety Failures
How workers were put at risk
| 01 | Prieto’s predecessor at the facility, Daniel Pond, testified that clearing metal scraps from inside the gap was a routine part of operating the machine. Cincinnati designed a system where workers had work-related reasons to enter a lethal pinch point. | High |
| 02 | The gap where Prieto died was less than 12 inches wide. Workers who needed to enter were required to shimmy sideways with their back against the machine for eight feet. There was no safe way to perform this task because Cincinnati never designed one. | Medium |
| 03 | Even with a wall-side safety barrier in place, the estate’s expert testified that additional safety mechanisms were still necessary because multiple unguarded access points to the pinch point remained. The machine required layers of protection that Cincinnati never provided. | High |
Design and Maintenance Failures
How oversight broke down
| 01 | The machine was sold and installed around 2000. Prieto died in 2018, nearly two decades after Cincinnati first put this machine into service. The company had 18 years to add basic safety measures and never did. | High |
| 02 | A wall-side safety barrier was installed at some point after delivery but was subsequently removed. Cincinnati’s maintenance employee visited the facility multiple times after the barrier disappeared and never flagged its absence in maintenance reports. | High |
| 03 | The estate’s expert identified three separate safety measures that were absent from the final configuration: a wall-side barrier, an emergency stop accessible from the pinch point, and a pressure-sensitive safety mat. All three were feasible. None were present when Prieto died. | High |
🕐 Timeline of Events
Late 2000 / Early 2001
Cincinnati Incorporated designs, sells, and installs a laser-cutting system at InMetal (Industrial Metal Products Company) in Sharon, Massachusetts. A wall-side safety barrier is included at installation.
2000–2018
Cincinnati’s maintenance employee Jose Nunez visits InMetal periodically and completes maintenance reports. During these visits, the wall-side barrier disappears and Nunez never reports its absence to InMetal staff.
October 2017
InMetal hires Luis Prieto to operate the laser-cutting system. Prieto is reprimanded on at least one occasion for entering the gap between the machines.
July 12, 2018
While Prieto is inside the gap, his coworker activates the laser-cutting system. The steel support beam descends, trapping Prieto against the load frame and crushing his mid-section. Emergency responders take approximately 90 minutes to free him. Prieto dies shortly after extrication.
2018–2024
Christopher Alicea, as personal representative of Prieto’s estate, sues Cincinnati Incorporated in Massachusetts federal court for negligent design, negligent installation, and negligent failure to maintain and warn.
2024
The U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts grants Cincinnati’s motion for summary judgment on all claims, dismissing the case entirely. The estate appeals to the First Circuit.
February 6, 2026
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit vacates the district court’s ruling on the design claims and remands for trial, finding that a jury must decide whether Cincinnati’s failure to include an emergency stop and safety mat constituted a defective design. Summary judgment on installation and maintenance claims is affirmed.
💬 Direct Quotes from the Legal Record
Quote 1
Expert testimony on the safety mat
Worker Safety Failures
“There should have been a safety mat in between the edge of the loader and the load bed.”
💡 The estate’s own expert said it plainly: a basic, widely available safety device was absent from the machine. Cincinnati chose not to include it.
Quote 2
Expert testimony: Prieto would be alive
Core Allegations
“If Cincinnati had a safety mat there, [Prieto would] be alive now.”
💡 The causal chain is direct and undisputed: a safety mat would have stopped the machine. Prieto would have survived. Cincinnati did not install one.
Quote 3
Expert testimony on the E-stop
Core Allegations
“An E-stop should have been accessible from the area where Mr. Prieto was crushed.”
💡 A trapped worker had no way to stop the machine from inside the danger zone. Cincinnati designed a system with no self-rescue option.
Quote 4
Expert on why safety mats were needed even with a barrier
Design Failures
“Safety mats [were] still necessary, especially since there [were] work-related reasons for operators to enter this dangerous area.”
💡 Cincinnati cannot claim that a wall-side barrier alone made the machine safe. Multiple access points and legitimate work tasks meant the gap was always accessible and always deadly.
Quote 5
Court of Appeals on design defect
Corporate Accountability
“The estate has established a triable issue on whether there was a reasonable alternative design that could have prevented or mitigated Prieto’s injuries.”
💡 The First Circuit found the evidence strong enough that a jury must decide. A lower court tried to shield Cincinnati from accountability; the appeals court refused to allow it.
Quote 6
Expert report on feasibility of safety measures
Design Failures
“Cincinnati was negligent in failing to provide adequate guarding and safety measures… [the] measures [were] feasible and would not have impaired the utility or usefulness of the machines.”
💡 The safety measures were available. They were affordable. They would not have broken the machine. Cincinnati simply chose not to include them.
Quote 7
Prieto’s predecessor on entering the gap for work
Worker Safety Failures
“Metal scraps would periodically fall into the gap and would need to be cleared by the operator.”
💡 Workers entered the death trap because the machine required it. Cincinnati cannot dismiss Prieto’s presence in the gap as recklessness when routine operation sent workers there.
💬 Commentary
What exactly killed Luis Prieto?
Prieto was operating a laser-cutting system manufactured by Cincinnati Incorporated when he entered a narrow gap between two machine components. When his coworker activated the system, a steel support beam descended into the gap and pinned Prieto against the load frame, crushing his mid-section. He was trapped for approximately 90 minutes before emergency responders could free him. He died shortly after. The machine had no pressure-sensitive safety mat that would have stopped it when he entered the gap, and no emergency stop button he could reach from inside. Both were standard, available safety technologies.
Was Prieto doing something wrong by being in that gap?
That is precisely the question a jury must now answer, and the evidence cuts against Cincinnati’s preferred narrative. While InMetal’s owner testified that operators had no work reason to enter the gap, Prieto’s predecessor Daniel Pond testified that clearing metal scraps from inside the gap was a routine operational task. The company that designed the machine cannot escape responsibility by claiming workers had no reason to be in a danger zone that regular machine operation sent them into. The machine created the problem. Cincinnati failed to solve it.
Did Cincinnati know the machine had a dangerous pinch point?
Yes. The pinch point was a built-in feature of the system’s design: a gap between machine components where a descending steel beam created a crushing hazard. The fact that Cincinnati initially installed a wall-side safety barrier confirms that the company recognized the danger. The existence of that barrier is evidence that Cincinnati knew access to the pinch point needed to be controlled. The decision to design a machine without an emergency stop or safety mat is therefore not ignorance. It is a choice.
Cincinnati argues that safety features like an E-stop might make the machine more dangerous. Is that credible?
This argument should be seen for what it is: a litigation strategy designed to reframe worker safety features as liabilities. Cincinnati is essentially arguing that giving workers the ability to stop a machine from killing them would encourage them to be less careful. A jury of ordinary people will be asked to evaluate whether that logic holds. The First Circuit has already signaled that the argument goes to what a reasonable design looks like and is not a basis for dismissal.
How did Cincinnati nearly escape this lawsuit entirely?
The district court granted Cincinnati’s motion for summary judgment, dismissing all claims before a jury ever heard the evidence. The court relied heavily on the estate’s expert’s deposition statement that the wall-side barrier was “on its face reasonable,” interpreting that as an admission that the whole system was safely designed. The First Circuit rejected this reading, finding that the expert’s full testimony showed he believed additional safety measures were still needed regardless of the barrier. One level of the federal judiciary was prepared to let Cincinnati walk away from a worker’s death without a trial.
What does the appeals court ruling actually change?
The First Circuit’s February 2026 ruling vacates the dismissal on the design defect claims and sends them to trial in the District of Massachusetts. This means a jury will decide whether Cincinnati’s failure to include an emergency stop and a safety mat constituted a defective design under Massachusetts law. The claims related to the missing wall-side barrier (installation and maintenance) remain dismissed. The core question of whether the machine’s fundamental design was unreasonably dangerous to human life will now be heard by a jury.
What can I do to prevent this from happening again?
Contact your federal and state representatives and demand stronger enforcement of OSHA machine guarding standards, particularly for industrial equipment with moving components. Support organizations that advocate for worker safety, including the National Council for Occupational Safety and Health (National COSH). If you work with industrial machinery and believe your workplace has inadequate guarding, file a complaint directly with OSHA at osha.gov. If you are an attorney or legal advocate, assist workers and their families in understanding their rights under state product liability law. Share this story: corporate accountability for dangerous equipment only improves when the public demands it.
Is this case representative of a broader pattern?
Yes. The pattern here is well-documented: industrial machinery manufacturers sell equipment with known pinch points and crush hazards, omit basic safety mechanisms that are technically feasible and low-cost, rely on the facility operator to add or maintain safety barriers, and then deflect liability to the employer or the worker when someone is killed. The Alicea case fits this pattern precisely. Prieto died inside a gap that the machine itself created, while using a machine that lacked two standard safety features that the manufacturer’s own expert said should have been there. This is not a freak accident. It is the predictable result of a system that tolerates the cost of worker deaths being borne by workers and their families rather than the companies that profit from the machines.
💡 Explore Corporate Misconduct by Category
Corporations harm people every day — from wage theft to pollution. Learn more by exploring key areas of injustice.
- 💀 Product Safety Violations — When companies risk lives for profit.
- 🌿 Environmental Violations — Pollution, ecological collapse, and unchecked greed.
- 💼 Labor Exploitation — Wage theft, worker abuse, and unsafe conditions.
- 🛡️ Data Breaches & Privacy Abuses — Misuse and mishandling of personal information.
- 💵 Financial Fraud & Corruption — Lies, scams, and executive impunity.
