Release Number: 09-686-NAT
June 11, 2009
Contact: Jennifer Kaplan
Phone: 202-693-5052

Statement by U.S. Secretary of Labor Hilda L. Solis on death of Stephen Tyrone Johns

WASHINGTON - Secretary of Labor Hilda L. Solis today issued the following statement on the death of Stephen Tyrone Johns:

"For the past six years, Stephen Tyrone Johns put on his uniform and went to work as a security guard at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum. But yesterday, while performing his duties to serve and protect, he lost his life and before doing so, saved countless others.

"Stephen Tyrone Johns is among the 5,700 American workers, good men and women, who die every year just doing their jobs.

"As a lifelong advocate for workers and now as secretary of labor, I have the privilege of fighting for every American worker to come home safely to his or her family. Words cannot adequately express the sorrow I feel as I extend my deepest sympathies to the Johns family and to the families of all security guards whose lives were taken in defense of others."

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