After a former employee of A OK Walker Autoworks filed a complaint with state labor regulators in 2021 accusing the owner of failing to issue his final paycheck of $915, he got an unwelcome surprise: a mountain of 91,000 pennies, covered in oil, dumped in his driveway.
But the worker, Andreas Flaten, may be having the last laugh. The U.S. Department of Labor has filed a lawsuit against the Peachtree, Georgia-based auto repair shop and owner Miles Walker after deciding that the stunt amounted to retaliation.
According to the government's complaint, Walker decided to pay Flaten in pennies within hours of learning that he had contacted regulators over his missing paycheck.
"How can you make this guy realize what a disgusting example of a human being he is...," Walker stated, the Labor Department alleged in the suit. "[Y]ou know what? I've got plenty of pennies; I'l use them."
A worker engaging with the Labor Department is protected under federal law, according to the agency. "Workers are entitled to receive information about their rights in the workplace and obtain the wages they earned without fear of harassment or intimidation," an official with the agency's wage and hour division in Atlanta said in a statement Wednesday.
The Labor Department also determined that Walker had illegally deprived other workers at the shop of overtime pay, as well as failing to keep proper pay and work records. It is asking a U.S. district court in Georgia to bar the defendants from any future...
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