A new federal ruling puts joint employer liability in the crosshairs – are your contracts at risk?
A federal court ruled that GardaWorld and JLL must face trial over security guard wage claims, putting joint employer liability squarely in the spotlight.
On February 20, 2026, a federal judge in Washington, D.C. declined to throw out most of the wage claims brought by two security guards against their employer, GardaWorld, a global private security firm, and Jones Lang LaSalle Americas, JLL, a global commercial real estate and investment management company. The ruling sends the case to trial and carries real lessons for any HR team that relies on contractors, outsourced workers, or third-party staffing arrangements.
The two workers, Cesar Rivas and Enyis Velasquez, allege they were assigned to roles that qualified as security officer positions under D.C. law but were paid below the mandatory minimum wage that applies to those roles. According to the plaintiffs, the required rate reached $24.19 per hour in combined wages and benefits from July 2023 through June 2024. GardaWorld, they claim, simply was not paying it.
Judge Sparkle L. Sooknanan of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia found that enough of their claims had merit to go before a jury, while drawing some clear lines about what the workers can and cannot recover.
One of those lines involves worker certification, and it matters a great deal for HR professionals managing licensed or credentialed...
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