BRIDGEPORT — A federal judge has ordered the owners of former restaurants in Bridgeport and Stratford to pay $150,000 to nine former employees they had been accused of forcing to pay kickbacks.
U.S. District Judge Stefan Underhill ordered Christopher Delmonico and Niall O’Neill to make the payment to the former employees within 90 days.
“The defendants engaged in a chain of illegal actions, first underpaying employees and then terminating an employee and threatening employees with immigration consequences, law enforcement action or blacklisting because they asserted their workplace rights and wished to keep the money due them,” said Maia Fisher, of the U.S. Department of Labor in Boston.
Delmonico formerly owned Chubby’s Restaurant in Bridgeport and was co-owner with O’Neill of The Ole Dog Tavern, formerly Lazy Dog Tavern, in Stratford. Both restaurants have since closed.
Neither they nor their lawyers responded to calls and emails for comment.
According to the labor department, the two men had previously been found to have violated their employees’ labor rights and agreed to pay $137,465 in back pay to the employees.
However, the labor department claims that after agreeing to pay back their employees what they owed them, Delmonico and O’Neill threatened the employees to force them to kick back approximately $50,000 that the employees were owed.
The labor department states that the restaurant owners allegedly fired one employee for requesting the full amount of back wages...
NC said on Tuesday it filed a complaint with Seoul’s Gangnam Police Station against the operator of the YouTube channel Yeongraegi, alleging dissemination of false information and obstruction of b...