San Diego Official Disciplined After Local Workers Throw Homeless Person into Garbage Truck

A senior official of San Diego’s Environmental Services Department was disciplined last week over a recent incident in which a homeless person almost died after being thrown into a garbage truck.

For the last few weeks, city administrators have been dealing with legal complaints after public service workers threw a tent into the back of a trash truck…while a homeless person was still inside of it. Fortunately, the vagrant was able to avoid getting crushed, as the unidentified person started screaming and kicking just before the garbagemen activated the hydraulic compactor.

City officials told local media in December that the homeless person was helped out of the truck, though they walked away before workers could offer assistance, collect information, or even mark the individual’s gender. Work was suspended after the incident that day, and local officials presume the garbage crew thought that the tent was filled with bedding and miscellaneous debris since police recently approved the area for a clear out.

“This was a terrible incident and all involved were shaken by what occurred,” deputy chief operating officer Pat Gomez said in a statement last month.

An investigation was launched into the near-disaster, and according to LA Times, Waste Reduction Deputy Director Angela Colton was in charge of San Diego’s effort to address the increasing number of local homeless encampments over the last few years. Colton was escorted out of City Hall on Friday, and though she refused to say anything, city spokeswoman Katie Keach told reporters that “Appropriate disciplinary action has been taken.”

[Image via screengrab]

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