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Worker Crushed At Santander
posted (April 25, 2016)
There was a terrible accident at the Santander Farm near Valley of Peace this morning. 21 year old Guatemalan Francisco Andres Sebastian a resident of Cotton Tree Village was mowed by a harvester.

It happened at around 11:58 this morning, and police suspect that Sebastian was resting in the field when the harvester, driven by another employee ran over him, causing severe damage to his body and killing him almost instantaneously.

Right now police are still gathering statements but so far it seems to be a genuine accident. However they say that if there is any fault suspected, they will arrest the driver and proceed with the matter as a criminal investigation. In the meantime Beverly Burke, the Public Relations officer for Santander told what occurred.

Beverly Burke, PR, Santander
"We had an electrical issue with the harvester. The harvester stopped and the electrical guy was called in and he went out to the fields where he was working on the harvester. He took maybe about 35-45 minutes to get it up and running. So all this while the guy went, when the driver was ready to resume work after the harvester was started, basically they checked the fields and no one was in sight, what they suspected to have happen was that they had probably found a cool spot within the cane field and the man had dozed off. You don't really see between the canes that you are cutting. That was what happened, the harvester. Basically sucked him in."

The body now awaits a post mortem examination at the Western Regional Hospital. Santander Group issued a press release today expressing their remorse for the unfortunate incident that led to the death of Francisco and said that the entire company is distraught.

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