Two directors of a company in Wandsworth have been fined after a worker died when when was crushed by six tonnes of stone slabs.

Ronald Douglas, 51, was about to unload slabs from the back of a lorry at Marble City in Smugglers Way when six tonnes of stone, which were in a trailer parked on a sloped road had not been restrained, fell on him.

He died from his injuries in hospital a week later.

The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) prosecuted Marble City Ltd and its directors Gavin and Jamie Waldron following the incident on March 20, 2008, outside the company’s site in Smugglers Way.

Judge Taylor at Southwark Crown Court heard company director Gavin Waldron was supervising the unloading operation.

The court heard two other employees Franco Moscelli and Gelsomino Pacifico were injured when they tried to catch the slabs and became trapped themselves.

Marble City was fined £100,000 and ordered to pay costs of £47,564 after pleading guilty to breaching two sections of the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974.

Directors, Gavin and Jamie Waldron, also each pleaded guilty to two breaches of the act and were fined £10,000 each.

The HSE investigation found the company had operated an unsafe system of work for unloading deliveries to the site for several years and also found Gavin Waldron failed to establish Mr Pacifico’s competence or make any effort to brief him on the unloading operation.

HSE Inspector, Andrew Verrall-Withers, said: “Many employers have good intentions, but fail to protect their employees as well as they think they are.

"Employers need to check how well they are protecting their employees and not find out they are failing when tragically it is too late and someone is hurt and killed.

"The Defendant’s system of work for unloading slabs of stone was dangerous, but it would have been fairly easy to make it much safer.”

Mr Douglas, from Vauxhall, was married with children and grandchildren.

A yard foreman who had worked at the company for nearly 20 years, he had been in the stone industry for more than three decades, and staff said his skills were wide-ranging.

At the time Gavin Waldron described the death as a “freak accident” and praised Mr Douglas.

He said: “He was extremely hard working and very experienced. He was a fantastic person - knowledgeable, funny, and a mentor to a lot of people in the company.”