There’s been some shady business dealings happening in California lately.
Three lawsuits against three separate California businesses have racked up a total of over $7 million in fines. This total reflects monetary damages, back pay, and penalties.
Curious what went down to result in such massive penalties? We’ll break it down and share all of the drama.
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California has been having some issues, but that’s no excuse for the behavior of the offending employers.
The first offender is against the owner of multiple Wingstop locations in Bakersfield. The owner, Clinton Lewis, disguised the ownership of the five Wingstop locations he managed. Lewis shared employees across the different locations while reporting each location as a separate employer.
This malicious behavior entitled Lewis to pay a lower minimum wage rate (the rate is lower for businesses with fewer employees), as well as to bypass other labor laws.
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The employees were denied pay for missed meal breaks, as well as missed overtime pay. They also weren’t compensated for the time spent traveling from one location to another when they had been scheduled at multiple locations.
Keep in mind that this case is against one owner of the franchise, not Wingstop itself.
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The California Labor Commissioner’s Office settled the case for $1.7 million. The settlement impacts 550 workers between 2019-2022, and the employer is required to pay $5 for every $1 that was owed.
It pays to follow the rules, wouldn’t you say?
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Several owners and operators of a network of poultry processing plants are under fire in “one of the largest wage violation settlements ever reached for U.S. poultry workers”, according to the Department of Labor.
This one has to do with child labor laws, and the details are appalling.
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The poultry enterprise was found to employ children as young as 14, subjecting them to unsafe working conditions such as using sharp knives to debone poultry.
These unsafe labor laws violate child labor laws, resulting in $171,919 in child labor law fines alone.
It wasn’t just the unsafe working conditions, though.
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The owners responsible didn’t pay overtime when it was earned (beyond 40 hours in a workweek), and they went as far as falsifying payroll information to skirt around paying their workers what they were owed.
The child labor law violations, back wages due…any guesses on how much the poultry plant owners responsible for the mess owe?
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Let’s tally all of this up…
- $4.8 million in back wages and damages (spread among 476 workers)
- $171,919 in penalties for child labor law violations
- The employers also have to give up profits of $1 million (from earnings gained through unlawful child labor)
To make it worse, the guilty supervisors reportedly harassed the employees over their decision to seek justice…
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According to the 2024 investigation of this case by the US Wage & Hour Office in Los Angeles, supervisors reportedly told the mistreated employees to put the “noose around their own necks” for talking to the department.
As if that isn’t bad enough, the supervisors also called them derogatory slurs and changed the terms of their employment as a punishment for speaking out.
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The last case has to do with sick leave violations. (Quite the variety we have here, isn’t it?)
A restaurant in southern California was found guilty of violating sick leave laws for its employees. According to California’s Healthy Workplace, Healthy Families Act of 2014, employers who have worked at least 30 days are entitled to accrue sick leave.
Food Source LLC failed to comply with these sick leave laws and is also guilty of wage theft.
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The lawsuit against Food Source LLC accused the owner of denying sick leave to employees, failing to indicate that sick leave was available on pay stubs, and withholding supplemental paid sick leave during COVID-19.
In addition, the owner broke overtime laws and owes a total of nearly $576,000 in back pay, overtime, damages, and penalties. This suit impacts at least 90 workers.
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So there you have it. The fraudulent Wingstop owner falsely counted each location as a separate entity to pay employees less, the poultry processing plants broke child labor laws, and the restaurant owner denied their employees paid sick time and committed wage theft.
It’s great to see justice served for these deserving employees, but it makes you sick to think that this type of fraud can happen, doesn’t it?
Which case was the most offensive to you? Drop your thoughts in the comments if you have a second!
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