Here, at a glance, recent case summaries demonstrating The Wage Justice Center’s innovative legal work:

THE DISAPPEARING FACTORY: LAURA’S STORY

Like many garment factory workers in Los Angeles, Laura worked 7 days per week, approximately 60 hours per week and was paid less than minimum wage. With the help of LAFLA and UCLA School of Law students, she filed a wage claim with the labor commissioner and one year later received a judgment of about $28,000 for unpaid wages and penalties against the corporation that owned the garment factory.

However, her story didn’t end there. The owners of the factory had dissolved the corporation during the proceedings and claimed that the business was no longer in operation. The state was unable to enforce the judgment. After two years of frustration, Laura turned to The Wage Justice Center for help.

Our investigation led to a critical discovery—that the defendants had created a new garment shop corporation at the same address as the dissolved one during the Labor Commissioner proceedings. In response, The Wage Justice Center filed a civil suit that included causes of action for fraud, fraudulent transfer, alter ego, and improper distribution of corporate assets to shareholders and directors. Within two months of filing and serving the complaint, the defendants agreed to pay all of the wages owed to Laura.

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DEFRAUDED OF $100,000: FIVE GARMENT WORKERS

In 2007 and 2008 The Wage Justice Center represented five garment workers in a joint lawsuit, seeking to enforce approximately $100,000 of unpaid wages that had been ordered paid by the California Labor Commissioner in 2005. These workers had received a piece rate that amount to approximately of $3.65 per hour, well below the minimum wage. Their former employers, a husband and wife who owned a garment factory, had transferred over $1 million worth of assets including their home and another business to their college-age son for no money only three months after the judgments were entered into the court.

Prior to our representation, the workers had assigned the enforcement of their judgments to the State of California, but the State returned the judgments stating they could not be enforced because the defendants had no assets. The factory owners had gotten away with not paying a single dime of the money labor commissioner found was owed to their workers.

The Wage Justice Center filed a fraudulent transfer lawsuit. And after a great deal of discovery and a long mediation, The Wage Justice Center was able to reach an agreement mandating the employers pay off the wages owed to the workers while providing a deed of trust to the workers to secure full payment.

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DISRESPECT AND UNPAID WAGES: NNEKA’S STORY

Nneka was working for a tax service company before she was abruptly fired and sent home without her final wages or her dignity. “I was often ridiculed and ostracized because I wore a headscarf,” says Nneka. “The owner attacked me the day I was fired and sent me home with nothing. She physically pulled my scarf off my head and called me names.”

Nneka navigated the Labor Commissioner wage-claim process on her own, obtaining a judgment for $7,341.14 in unpaid wages. However, her former employers refused to pay and even went so far as to falsely represent to the Labor Commissioner that she had been paid (a representation that was proven false). Legal Aid was unable to help Nneka due a lack of expertise in the law of remedies and referred her to The Wage Justice Center. With our help, she was able to collect all of the unpaid wages in less than four months through a levy on the tax business’s bank account.