Why We Install Osprey Crane Systems: Lessons From a $3.4 Million Manslaughter Conviction

A worker is told to do the job safely. No anchor point, no static line, nothing to connect to. That is the entire safety system, and in 2021 it cost a worker his life on a concrete warehouse floor.

In June 2026, Risham Nominees Pty Ltd was fined $3.4 million in the Victorian Supreme Court for workplace manslaughter after worker Jassim Al Shadori fell 4.5 metres onto concrete while removing roof panels at the company’s Reservoir warehouse. Justice Jacinta Forbes found the fall risk was readily foreseeable, and that the company director should have recognised it. Workers had no fall protection and no instruction beyond being told to be careful. It is only the second workplace manslaughter conviction handed down in Victoria since the offence was introduced in 2020.

If you are an operations manager, a general manager, or a director in a manufacturing business that handles tilt panels by crane, that case is worth sitting with for longer than a minute. Your operator’s task is not removing roof panels. It is climbing onto the panel once it is in position, connecting or disconnecting the clutch, the crane’s attachment point to the panel, then climbing back down. The height is roughly the same as the Reservoir fall. The floor underneath is the same unforgiving concrete. The difference is that the Risham fall happened during a single task, while your operator does this same climb up, connect or disconnect, climb down sequence every time a panel moves, which can mean dozens of times a shift. It is not a question of whether someone could be standing unprotected on top of a panel. It is a question of when, because the task happens again in an hour, and again tomorrow.

That is the problem we see when we walk a warehouse floor for the first time. The physical hazard is not obvious in the way a roof is obvious. It looks like a quick job: climb up, undo the clutch, climb down. The harder problem is the one that sits with you specifically. The Risham conviction did not stop at the company. It reached the director personally, because the court found he should have recognised a risk that was there to be seen. If you are the operations manager or general manager who signs off on how the clutch task is done, or the director ultimately accountable for it, an instruction to be careful up there is not a system, and a court has just shown what happens when that is all there is. Underneath that accountability is a simpler truth we come back to often. The operator climbing onto that panel for the tenth time today deserves the same protection as the first time.

We have stood on warehouse floors and watched an operator climb onto a panel with nothing to clip onto while they handle the clutch. We understand the pressure operations managers and directors are under, because this is not a one off access problem to solve and move on from. It is a task your team repeats every shift, for as long as panels are moved by crane.

We supply and install Osprey crane mounted fall arrest systems and fixed anchor points engineered around your actual crane and clutch setup, then certify the install so you have a documented record that the risk was identified and addressed. We provide training material and run a hands on session with your operators so every person who climbs onto a panel knows exactly how to connect to the system first, every time, not just on installation day. Our documentation tells your team and anyone who audits your site exactly what is installed, what it is rated for, and when it was last inspected.

Picture what success looks like. Panels are still moved by crane the same way they always have been, except now every operator clips on before they climb onto a panel to handle the clutch, your team has been trained to do it properly, and you have documentation that shows the risk was identified and addressed. Now picture the alternative. An operator climbs onto a panel unprotected because that is how it has always been done, and the sequence repeats every shift until the day it does not go to plan. The Risham case is exactly that outcome, and for a task repeated this many times a day at this height, it is not a matter of if that gap gets found out. It is a matter of when.

If your operators climb onto panels to connect or disconnect the clutch and the only protection right now is being careful, that is the gap to close before it closes itself. Call us on 03 9555 3586, email sales@anchored.com.au or visit anchored.com.au to talk about a crane mounted fall arrest system, certification and training built around your actual clutch task.