The Federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has fined Gilster-Mary Lee Corporation $91,262 after citing the Chester-based food manufacturer for multiple serious safety violations following the death of a worker at the company’s Perryville cereal plant last June.
The penalties, initially proposed at $207,112, were reduced following an informal settlement between OSHA and the company — a more than 55 percent reduction from the original amount.
The citations stem from OSHA’s investigation into the death of Nicolas Lopez Gomez, 38, a Guatemalan national who was found dead inside an industrial oven at the plant on Old St. Marys Road on June 26, 2025. Perry County Coroner Meghan Ellis identified Lopez Gomez, who had been working at the plant under the alias Edward Avila for nine years. The company said at the time that he “was fatally injured in a cereal drying system that was out of service.”
OSHA’s findings accuse Gilster-Mary Lee of exposing workers to mechanical, thermal and crushing hazards and failing to ensure that equipment was fully de-energized before maintenance activities. The citations also include improper confined-space entry procedures, unsafe ladder usage and a lack of permits, attendants and rescue planning.
The most serious citation found that the company’s “procedures did not clearly and specifically outline the scope, purpose, authorization, rules, and techniques to be utilized for the control of hazardous energy, and the means to enforce compliance,” according to OSHA.
OSHA has set a deadline of May 15, 2026, for the company to correct all cited violations. The case remains open as the agency monitors corrective actions.
The fine represents the latest chapter in a long and troubling history of federal safety violations for Gilster-Mary Lee, which was the subject of a Republic-Monitor investigation in October 2025. That investigation found that over the past two decades, OSHA inspections at Gilster plants have documented multiple injuries and fatalities, including at least 10 amputations, and resulted in approximately $200,000 in fines across 18 cases — not including the Lopez Gomez death.
Republic-Monitor investigation in October 2025. That investigation found that over the past two decades, OSHA inspections at Gilster plants have documented multiple injuries and fatalities, including at least 10 amputations, and resulted in approximately $200,000 in fines across 18 cases — not including the Lopez Gomez death.
Just nine months before Lopez Gomez’s death, another worker at the same Perryville plant lost an arm in a September 2024 incident that also involved lockout/ tagout violations. OSHA initially proposed penalties exceeding $76,000 for that incident, but the amount was negotiated down to $20,000.
Gilster-Mary Lee has been in OSHA’s Severe Violator Enforcement Program since 2012, when a dust explosion at the company’s pasta manufacturing plant in Steeleville, Ill., severely burned two workers. That incident resulted in $231,000 in fines and three willful violations. The program targets employers who have demonstrated indifference to their safety obligations through willful, repeated or failure-to-abate violations, and subjects them to mandatory follow-up inspections and increased federal monitoring.
Founded in 1895 and headquartered in Chester, Gilster-Mary Lee is one of the region’s largest private-label food manufacturers, operating multiple plants across Illinois and Arkansas with more than 2,000 employees. The company produces breakfast cereals, cake and baking mixes, pasta, dinner kits and other packaged foods.
