Thread: California Jury Slaps Wal-Mart with $172.3 Million Verdict

http://www.newsinferno.com/storypages/1 ... 5~001.html

California Jury Slaps Wal-Mart with $172.3 Million Verdict for Curtailing Employee Lunch Breaks
Date Published: December 26, 2005
Source: Newsinferno News Staff

In the past few years, Wal-Mart has lost much of the employee-friendly atmosphere so carefully cultivated by its founder, Sam Walton. In fact, the retail giant has accumulated quite a laundry list of problems that threaten to keep the company bogged down in litigation for years to come.

Some of the more problematic situations that have developed since 2003 are:

In October 2003, federal authorities raided 60 Wal-Mart stores in 21 states as well as its corporate headquarters and arrested some 245 illegal aliens being used on cleaning crews hired by outside contractors. It was reported at the time that recording of meetings and conversations among Wal-Mart executives, managers, and contractors confirmed that the retailer knew of the violations that were occurring at its stores across the country.

Immediately following these enforcement actions, Wal-Mart pledged cooperation in the investigation into the employment practices of its cleaning contractors. Wal-Mart also renewed its commitment to ensure full compliance with federal immigration laws and eventually entered into a consent decree that: Directs Wal-Mart to make a payment of $11 million through the United States Attorney’s Office; Permanently enjoins Wal-Mart from knowingly hiring, recruiting and continuing to employ unauthorized aliens workers; Directs Wal-Mart to establish a means to verify that independent contractors are also taking reasonable steps to comply with immigration laws; Directs Wal-Mart to provide, over the next 18 months, all of its store managers and future store managers with training regarding immigration employment laws while complying with pertinent anti-discrimination laws; Directs Wal-Mart to maintain its own pre-existing program of taking reasonable steps to ensure that Wal-Mart employees are authorized to work in the United States, while complying with pertinent anti-discrimination laws; Directs Wal-Mart to continue cooperation in the investigation of the alleged illegal employment.

On November 18, 2005, a raid by federal, state, and local authorities at a Wal-Mart Stores construction site in Pennsylvania netted about 125 arrests for alleged immigration violations. T he men were working on a distribution center in eastern Pennsylvania. Wal-Mart stated that those arrested were employees of a subcontractor and that “we have written contracts with these subcontractors requiring that they follow all applicable local, state and federal employment laws. We will cooperate fully with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and the U.S. attorney's office in this matter."

In February 2004, a civil rights suit filed against Wal-Mart by illegal immigrants was expanded to accuse the company of locking its janitors inside stores during night shifts.

Wal-Mart continues to face challenges by striking workers who are seeking to unionize the company’s workforce. This has lead to strong opposition to Wal-Mart expansion into a number of areas by the UFCW grocery workers’ union and local political leaders with strong union ties.

The company is also embroiled in a massive federal class-action involving over 1.5 million current and former female employees alleging sex discrimination. Currently, the issue of whether class-action status will be granted is on appeal in California.
Now, another major problem is costing the retailer a small fortune to resolve. It seems that Wal-Mart has also been failing to respect the rights of its employees to have a 30-minute unpaid lunch break.

Wal-Mart is facing 40 lawsuits across the country that claim it of deliberately allowing its employees to work unpaid overtime, or to work during legally required breaks. In 2004 the company paid $50 million to settle litigation in Colorado and a jury in Oregon returned a verdict for about $200,000 ($2,000 to each of some 100 employees) based on similar claims.

The latest bad news for Wal-Mart came in the form of a $172.3 million verdict in Oakland, California, where state law requires employers to give their employees a 30-minute unpaid break or to pay them if they decline.

The jury award consisted of $115 million in punitive damages and $57.3 million in compensatory damages to the workers. It came after a three-month trial of a class-action lawsuit brought on behalf of some 116,000 California Wal-Mart employees who worked for the company between 2001 and 2005.

Although the company denied the allegations by claiming that most of the workers either waived their meal periods or failed to demand penalty wages in a timely manner, the plaintiffs’ argued that Wal-Mart knew it was breaking the law and consciously pressured employees to work during their meal breaks.

According to plaintiffs’ attorneys, internal audits obtained in discovery showed Wal-Marts top management was aware it was not granting meal breaks on thousands of occasions. One company document even called results of the audit "a chronic problem."

Wal-Mart pledged cooperation in the investigation into the employment practices of its cleaning contractors. Wal-Mart also renewed its commitment to ensure full compliance with federal immigration laws and eventually entered into a consent decree that: Directs Wal-Mart to make a payment of $11 million through the United States Attorney’s Office; Permanently enjoins Wal-Mart from knowingly hiring, recruiting and continuing to employ unauthorized aliens workers; Directs Wal-Mart to establish a means to verify that independent contractors are also taking reasonable steps to comply with immigration laws; Directs Wal-Mart to provide, over the next 18 months, all of its store managers and future store managers with training regarding immigration employment laws while complying with pertinent anti-discrimination laws; Directs Wal-Mart to maintain its own pre-existing program of taking reasonable steps to ensure that Wal-Mart employees are authorized to work in the United States, while complying with pertinent anti-discrimination laws; Directs Wal-Mart to continue cooperation in the investigation of the alleged illegal employment.

Sounds like the foundation for a new set of guidelines to qualify a company as an "Illegal Free Employment Employer" (IFEE). Or, how about something like an "Illegal Immigant Free Employer (IIFE). You know how companies claim to employ all races and creeds. Well, we need to initiate a program similar to EOE laws. Or we need to ammend these EOE laws with this idea. I can see it now..a sign hanging in every company that claims that they are IIFE compiant. Just like employers now are EOE compliant (Yea, right). Just like computers were Y2K compliant. Thoughts?