Perdue, Tyson probed by feds over employing migrant children

Perdue Farms and Tyson Foods are under federal investigation following reports that migrant children were contracted to clean the poultry giants’ meat-processing plants during overnight shifts, including one young teen who had his arm mutilated by a razor-sharp deboning machine.

The Labor Department confirmed to The Post that it’s probing a Tyson plant and a separate Perdue plant, both in Virginia, though “no additional details can be provided as the investigations are ongoing,” an agency spokesperson said.

According to Perdue’s website, the fresh and frozen chicken provider has six so-called “AgriBusiness” locations in Virginia, while a spreadsheet on Tyson’s website shows that it only has one chicken plant in the state, in Temperanceville.

A spokesperson for Perdue told The Post that the company hadn’t been notified of an investigation, though a statement on the company website said the company plans to take accountability and will “cooperate fully with any government inquiry on this matter.”

The investigation was launched following an exposé in New York Times Magazine last week that revealed a 14-year-old boy named Marcos Crux was working the night shift at a Perdue-operated chicken slaughterhouse in Accomack County, Va., which processes 1.5 million chickens per week.

It was during one six-hour shift — which would make Crux some $100, more than one month’s salary in his home in Guatemala — that Crux was sucked into a conveyor belt, butchering his left forearm.

Though doctors were able to save his arm using skin grafts from his thigh, according to The Times, he wasn’t the only young teen scrubbing the Perdue pant of grease and blood during a midnight-to-5 a.m. shift.

One-third of the Perdue plant’s overnight cleaning crew was made up of children, workers told The Times.

They’re all reportedly employed by Fayette Industrial, the Tennessee-based cleaning company that had been hired by Perdue to wash bloodied floors, razor-sharp machines and other equipment using a pressurized hose that sprays scalding hot, 130-degree water.

Fayette is facing a federal investigation along with QSI Sanitation — which works with Tyson as part of chemical sanitation conglomerate The Vincit Group, according to The Times.

Crux got the job over a year ago with the help of a middle-school classmate who already worked at the Perdue plant, The Times reported.

At the time, aged 13, Crux proceeded to buy fake documents for $800 that said he was a man in his 20s named Francisco, and then got to work donning rubber overalls, steel-toed rubber boots and two layers of gloves to protect against chemical burns.

The young teen crossed the US border from Guatemala as his parents knew that minors traveling by themselves were allowed into the country thanks to the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act of 2008, which was put into place to protect children looking to come to America who would otherwise be in harm.

His family bet against their land to pay an adult $6,000 to accompany Crux to the US safely, per The Times. He then found his way to a cousin living between Virginia’s largest employers — a Perdue plant and a Tyson Foods plant, which together produce one-third of the poultry sold nationwide.

Perdue spokesperson Andrea Staub told The Post that the company was “appalled by these recent allegations.”

“We are conducting a comprehensive third-party audit of child labor prevention and protection procedures including a compliance audit of contractors. We will take appropriate actions based on the findings of that investigation. We have not been notified, but plan to cooperate fully with any government inquiry on this matter.

Representatives for Tyson Foods and Fayette Industrial did not immediately respond to The Post’s request for comment.

Though minors are barred from jobs like cleaning slaughterhouses, repairing roofs and other construction gigs, it’s not the first time 13- and 14-year-olds like Crux have been found working in these dangerous occupations.

In May, the Labor Department released disturbing photos showing kids as young as 13 wearing protective glasses, hard hats, gloves and water-wicking jackets working for Packers Sanitation Services Inc. (PSSI) at a meat processing plant in Grand Island, Neb.

The kids likely washed bloody floors and razor-sharp machines, like back saws, head splitters and brisket saws, with potent chemicals and hot water, an investigator for the federal agency told “60 Minutes” anchor Scott Pelley earlier this year.

The Labor Department launched its investigation into PSSI last August after a 14-year-old girl at Walnut Middle School in Grand Island came to school with acid burns on her hands and knees.

The ensuing probe found that the company hired 102 children between the ages of 13 and 17 among PSSI’s thousands of workers at 13 meat-packing plants in eight different states.