California company must pay $140,000 in back wages and damages to 35 employees
The owners and operators of Che Garibaldi – operator of Taqueria Garibaldi – have been ordered to pay $140,000 in back wages and damages to 35 restaurant employees after they allegedly tapped the services of a person identified as a priest to force workers to confess “workplace sins”.
During litigation by the U.S. Department of Labor in federal court, an employee of Che Garibaldi told the court the priest urged workers to “get the sins out”. The priest also asked employees of the northern California restaurant if they had stolen from the employer, been late for work, had done anything to harm their employer or if they had bad intentions toward their employer.
This “may be among the most shameless” ways to intimidate or retaliate against employees, the department said in a press release.
The court’s decision follows an investigation by the department’s Wage and Hour Division that found Taqueria Garibaldi denied employees overtime pay for hours over 40 in a workweek, a violation of the Fair Labor Standards Act.
The division also found that the employer paid managers from the employee tip pool illegally, threatened employees with retaliation and adverse immigration consequences for cooperating with the department, and fired one worker who they believed had complained to the department.
“Under oath, an employee of Taqueria Garibaldi explained how the restaurant offered...
A slew of NYPD officers recounted on Sunday horror stories from their careers in which they say they were falsely accused of sexual misconduct and, despite being exonerated, had the allegations sh...