The court heard multiple forklift-related safety incidents have occurred at the Griffith factory. Photo: Real Juice Company/Facebook.
A Riverina juice company and its director have been fined $250,000 after a forklift ran over a female employee’s foot.
Real Juice Company Pty Ltd operates a juice-bottling and packaging factory in Griffith.
According to a published court judgment, quality assurance officer Grace Poletta had been with the company since around 2010.
On 7 November, 2022, Ms Poletta was struck and knocked to the ground by a reversing forklift as she walked into the factory’s bottling room. She suffered horrific injuries to her left foot, including a severe degloving injury, fractures, and trauma so significant it required a six-week hospital stay and the amputation of all five of her toes.
In a recent decision in the NSW Industrial Court, Justice Jane Paingakulam said the factory lacked systems to separate workers from moving machinery, making it common for multiple forklifts to drive alongside pedestrians in the bottling room. There were no guardrails, painted walkways, or traffic management plans, and existing warning signs were routinely hidden because the pedestrian door was left open. Furthermore, staff received no formal safety training or competency checks, with forklift drivers simply given a generic direction to “drive safely”.
Justice Paingakulam said the risk of a forklift injury occurring was “patently obvious”.
Both the company and its sole director and shareholder, Anthony Taliano, 47, pleaded guilty in March 2026.
Real Juice Company was charged with failing to comply with its workplace health and safety duty, while Mr Taliano was charged with failing to ensure the company followed its workplace safety duties.
Mr Taliano acknowledged and expressed deep regret over the incident. He said he was, and always had been, committed to ensuring the safety of Real Juice’s operations, its employees, and persons attending the premises. He said both he and Real Juice had learnt from this incident and were committed to ensuring the company’s operations and processes complied with the WHS Act.
In determining the final penalties, the court took several mitigating factors into account, noting that both the company and Mr Taliano had no prior criminal convictions and that the business had operated for more than 23 years without a court penalty.
The court also acknowledged that the company cooperated with authorities during the investigation and took immediate, extensive action to overhaul its factory safety systems. Given these significant upgrades and the ongoing engagement of a specialist safety consultant, Justice Paingakulam accepted that both the company and its director showed good prospects for rehabilitation and were highly unlikely to reoffend.
Justice Paingakulam ultimately found the incident fell in the upper mid-range of objective seriousness.
She said there was a high likelihood of a forklift-related incident occurring in the factory at the time, given the safety measures in effect in November 2022.
“The control measures to eliminate or minimise the risk were well publicised and not difficult to implement,” the judge said.
“The serious injuries suffered by Ms Poletta were a manifestation of the risk.”
The court also heard CCTV footage recorded the forklifts operating in “close proximity” to workers on the day of the incident.
Following the incident, Real Juice Company brought in a range of safety measures and expanded its training policies for forklift use. This included painting line markings, installing fixed bollards, and capping forklift speeds at 10 km/h alongside a new pedestrian sensor system. The physical infrastructure upgrades cost $55,788, while the company spent an additional $42,155 to hire an external workplace safety consultant, bringing the total post-incident safety spend to nearly $98,000.
In a victim impact statement, the court heard Ms Poletta outline ongoing physical and mental impacts from the incident.
“Ms Poletta also provides evidence of the limitations presented by her disability on her ability to work, a consequence with ongoing adverse financial effects,” Justice Paingakulam said.
The court heard this was not the first time a worker’s foot was crushed at the factory. In October 2012, an employee suffered similar severe injuries after being struck by a reversing forklift. While an internal investigation at the time warned of a high risk of repeat accidents and recommended painting safe pedestrian zones, the company failed to take adequate action over the next 10 years and never reported the 2012 incident to SafeWork NSW.
Justice Paingakulam also rejected a bid from Mr Taliano to resolve the more recent Ms Poletta matter without a conviction.
Mr Taliano’s lawyer argued the incident had damaged his reputation, with a conviction only damaging it further. He also argued the imposition of a criminal conviction was a very serious consequence and pointed to the significant overlap between the offences to which he and Real Juice had pleaded guilty.
However, Justice Paingakulam labelled that as “speculative”.
During sentencing, Mr Taliano argued for a reduced fine, citing high living expenses and his role as the sole financial supporter for a large extended family.
“This court has no evidence about the value of his assets, which include an investment property and shares, or his ability to borrow funds to pay a fine. Accordingly, Mr Taliano has not met his onus to establish, on the balance of probabilities, that he has reduced capacity to pay a fine,” the judge ruled.
Justice Paingakulam ultimately convicted both the company and Mr Taliano of their charges.
Real Juice Company was convicted and fined $240,000, reduced from $300,000 due to its guilty plea and cooperation with authorities. The court also ordered the company to pay for a full-page public notice detailing the case in a local newspaper.
Mr Taliano was personally convicted and fined $9600, reduced from $12,000 for the same reasons. Both Mr Taliano and the company must also pay the prosecutor’s legal costs, with half of the total fine amounts going directly to the prosecutor.
Original Article published by Claire Sams on Region Riverina.
