MEMPHIS, Tenn — 86-year-old Verna Mae Jackson has been identified as the employee killed in an accident at the FedEx World Hub in Memphis after a work injury on Wednesday.
The family's lawyer Jeffrey Rosenblum said Jackson, a longtime employee at the FedEx hub, was killed last week when she saw an envelope sticking out of a container and hurried to grab it.
"Her family wants the community to know that she loved working for FedEx, and she loved the people that she worked with," Jeffrey Rosenblum, the family's attorney, said.
Loved ones took to social media saying, in part, "…my heart [hurts] so bad right now" and "...she was the sweetest lady in the world."
Her church, Emmanuel Missionary Baptist Church, made a Facebook post describing Jackson as "a living, lasting memory" they will "treasure."
"The safety precautions that could've protected her were not in place. This was a completely preventable death," Rosenblum said.
According to Rosenblum, a "driver" pulling a load of mail didn't honk adequately enough to signal as they were driving off just as Jackson attempted to grab an envelope that was sticking out of a container.
"There's technology available that would allow the vehicle to make that sound, to warn, to alert that the vehicle is about to move before it moves an inch. And if we believe those precautions had been taken, if that equipment had been purchased or maybe it was there and not maintained appropriately, she wouldn't be dead," Rosenblum said.