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Shredder Accident Kills Worker

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By BILLY TOWNSEND, The Tampa Tribune

Published: November 22, 2007

BARTOW - Vernon Lambeth had fulfilled a dream.

After years of work as an electrician in California, Lambeth, 60, saved enough money to buy a house and orange grove on Lake Clinch in Frostproof, his childhood home. Lambeth moved to Frostproof with his wife and three children about two years ago.

"He was raised in Frostproof, and he decided he wanted the small-town life for his family," said Chyrel Lambeth, his sister-in-law.

He took a job with the Rotonics Manufacturing plastics plant in Bartow. It was there, in one awful instant Tuesday, that Lambeth was killed by an industrial shredding machine, the Polk County Sheriff's Office reported.
Lambeth was performing maintenance on the machine when a co-worker, not realizing Lambeth was working above him, turned on the shredder and Lambeth was pulled into it, sheriff's spokeswoman Donna Wood said.

The incident occurred just before noon at the Rotonics plant inside the Bartow Airport complex. Detectives arrived shortly after to investigate, Wood said.

They found that the shredding machine had been malfunctioning and that Lambeth and another employee were working on the upper level before the incident.

Wood said Lambeth's death appears accidental. The Medical Examiner's Office will determine a cause of death.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration went to the Rotonics plant to investigate. No comment from OSHA was available.

Lambeth, who has three brothers, is also survived by his wife and three children, ages 12 to 16, said Chyrel Lambeth, his sister-in-law. His children are enrolled at Frostproof Junior-Senior High School. The family attends First Baptist Church in Frostproof. Ministers from the church have been fixtures at the family home since Lambeth's death, Chyrel Lambeth said.

She described her brother-in-law as a family man who always made time for his wife and children, whether driving boats and personal watercraft with them on the lake or going to a restaurant for a weekly family night.

In his personal time, Lambeth loved tinkering in his orange grove, Chyrel Lambeth said.

Services have not been set.

Bartow Rotonics is one of 10 branches of Rotonics Manufacturing Inc. The Gardena, Calif.-based company bills itself as one of the largest "rotational molding" manufacturers in the United States.

Rotational molding is a process for creating a variety of plastic products. It makes kayaks, trash cans and planters, its Web site states.

Reporter Billy Townsend can be reached at (863) 284-1409 or

wtownsend@tampatrib.com.

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