Three construction companies fined without conviction have been convicted on appeal and their fines doubled to a total of $100,200

What changed for the three companies

WorkSafe Victoria’s release of 1 October 2026 says that in May 2026 KZ Construction Group Pty Ltd and Kerimov Constructions Pty Ltd were both fined $20,000 without conviction and Calibre Construction Victoria Pty Ltd was fined $10,000 without conviction in the Melbourne Magistrates’ Court, after each pleaded guilty to two charges of failing to provide a workplace that was safe and without risks to health. Then: Following an appeal, the Melbourne County Court set aside the original sentences on Wednesday 23 September, instead convicting the three companies.

Melbourne Magistrates’ Court, May 2026

• KZ Construction Group: $20,000, without conviction
• Kerimov Constructions: $20,000, without conviction
• Calibre Construction Victoria: $10,000, without conviction

$50,000

Melbourne County Court on appeal, 23 September 2026

• KZ Construction Group: $40,000, convicted
• Kerimov Constructions: $40,000, convicted
• Calibre Construction Victoria: $20,200, convicted

$100,200

The companies had been engaged on five multi-storey townhouse units at a site in Footscray. In April 2024 an apprentice carpenter working on the first level of one unit fell 3.24 metres through a skylight void to the ground floor, suffering a brief loss of consciousness and minor injuries. Inspectors issued prohibition notices for unprotected live edges, skylight and stair voids on the first level, and guard rails and void coverings went in later that month.

The part a site manager should read twice is what happened next. In June 2024 an inspector went back and observed two workers on the second level of a unit at a height of six metres with inadequate fall protection in place. More notices followed, and the guard rails went on all five townhouses the next day. The release says it was reasonably practicable for the companies to install compliant guard railing and cover every void, and that Calibre also admitted it did not follow its safe work method statement. The companies were ordered to pay the costs originally imposed: $2,736 for KZ Construction and $3,123 each for Kerimov and Calibre.

1. April 2024 An apprentice carpenter falls 3.24 metres through a skylight void. Prohibition notices; guard rails and void coverings installed later that month.
2. June 2024 An inspector sees two workers at six metres with inadequate fall protection. More notices; guard rails on all five townhouses the next day.
3. May 2026 Melbourne Magistrates’ Court: guilty pleas, $50,000 in fines in total, no convictions.
4. 23 Sep 2026 Melbourne County Court sets the sentences aside, convicts all three and imposes $100,200.
5. 1 Oct 2026 WorkSafe Victoria publishes the outcome.

Seven releases, nine companies, one direction

This is not a one-off. We searched the news pages listed in WorkSafe Victoria’s sitemap on 10 October 2026 for addresses mentioning an appeal or a raised fine, and read every 2025 and 2026 match. Seven releases, starting in April 2025, report a company’s Magistrates’ Court sentence set aside by the County Court and a bigger fine imposed. Each one uses the same phrase, Following an appeal.

Fines before and after appeal, in WorkSafe Victoria’s releases, January 2025 to 10 October 2026

Magistrates’ Court fines, nine companies

$262,500

Seven of the nine fined without conviction

After the County Court appeals

$935,200

Six of those seven convicted; Van Berkel’s higher fine stayed without conviction

The incidents are ordinary ones. A supervisor’s head was caught in a blow moulding machine whose interlock was disconnected and the sensors which should have activated it had been covered with tape. A 66-year-old maintenance manager died after falling 3.3 metres through a shed roof with no fall protection. Hoarding left unsecured despite a subcontractor’s warnings collapsed and narrowly missed a pedestrian. A worker fell through a 58 centimetre gap beside a scaffold with no mid rails on that side. Six workers were burned in an explosion while a shredder was cutting up aerosol cans. A pipe layer was shocked after a seven metre aluminium pole was lifted near power lines. Each release names controls it says were reasonably practicable.

One more appeal sits outside the table because it took a different path. In April 2025 WorkSafe reported that LH Holding Management Pty Ltd, trading as Universal Stone and Marble, which it describes as the first company convicted under Victoria’s workplace manslaughter laws, had its $1.3 million fine set aside and replaced with a $3 million fine. That sentence came from the Supreme Court, not the Magistrates’ Court.

Two limits on what this shows. None of the eight releases says which party brought the appeal. And a regulator’s news page carries the outcomes it chooses to announce, so this list cannot tell you how many sentences were appealed and left alone or reduced. What it does show is that the regulator is publicising raised sentences, often. In the June 2025 release WorkSafe’s Executive Director Health and Safety, Sam Jenkin, said it would continue to fight for stronger penalties against employers who choose to put workers’ lives at risk.

Who can appeal, and what a conviction changes

The appeal routes are in the Criminal Procedure Act 2009 (Vic), and there are two. An offender can appeal a Magistrates’ Court sentence to the County Court under section 254. The Director of Public Prosecutions can appeal under section 257 if satisfied that an appeal should be brought in the public interest. Either appeal starts with a notice filed within 28 days after the day on which the sentence of the Magistrates’ Court is imposed, and either is heard afresh: the Act says each must be conducted as a rehearing.

Appeal by the offender (s 254)

• Against conviction and sentence, or sentence alone
• Notice within 28 days of the sentence (s 255)
• Heard as a rehearing; the court must warn that a more severe sentence is possible (s 256)

Appeal by the DPP (s 257)

• Against sentence, if the DPP is satisfied it is in the public interest
• Notice within 28 days of the sentence (s 258)
• Heard as a rehearing (s 259)

An offender who appeals is told the risk in writing before the notice is accepted. The registrar must hand over a notice to the effect that

on the appeal the court may impose a sentence more severe than that sought to be appealed against

Whether a conviction is recorded at all is a separate decision, under section 8 of the Sentencing Act 1991 (Vic). The court must consider all the circumstances, including the nature of the offence, the offender’s character and past history, and the impact of the recording of a conviction on the offender's economic or social wellbeing or on his or her employment prospects. A finding of guilt without a conviction is not a conviction for most purposes, but it is not a clean slate either. Section 8(3) says it has the same effect as if one had been recorded for the purpose of, among other things, proceedings against the offender for a subsequent offence.

Without conviction

The court weighs the offence, the offender’s history and the impact of a conviction (s 8(1))

Still counts

As if recorded, for an appeal against sentence and for proceedings over a later offence (s 8(3)(b))

On appeal

The County Court sets the sentence aside and can impose any sentence the Magistrates’ Court could have, conviction included (CPA s 256(2), s 259(2))

Our read

This is our view, built on the releases and Acts above. A fine without conviction in a Victorian Magistrates’ Court looks like the gentle end of a safety prosecution, and for most companies it probably is. But seven times since April 2025 WorkSafe has announced that one was reopened and came back heavier, by between nearly two and more than seven times the original fine, and eight of the nine companies ended up convicted. A company sentenced in the Magistrates’ Court should not treat the matter as closed until the 28-day appeal window has passed.

The more useful lesson is in the Footscray dates, not the court ones. The fall happened in April 2024, the rails and void covers went in, and two months later an inspector found workers six metres up without adequate protection. WorkSafe’s chief health and safety officer, Sam Jenkin, called failing to address the risks of falls especially after a workplace incident completely unacceptable, and that second visit is the obvious reading of the phrase. The controls in the table’s cases were not novel: guard rails, void covers, a harness, an interlock left connected, an exclusion zone around power lines.

Two cautions on our own reading. Victoria runs its own Occupational Health and Safety Act, not the model WHS law, and the appeal routes here are Victorian; we have not compared other states. And the releases give outcomes, not reasons, so we cannot say what persuaded the County Court in any of these cases.