SPLC guest worker suit featured in USA Today


Guest worker Armenio Pablo-Calmo is featured in USA Today.
(Photo by Sarah Reynolds)

Nov. 15, 2006 -- A Southern Poverty Law Center lawsuit aimed at stopping the exploitation of immigrants recruited to work in the forestry industry was featured today on the front page of USA Today.

The story focuses on the Center's lawsuit against Eller and Sons Trees Inc., which has recruited thousands of workers from Latin America to work in the pine forests of the South under the government’s guest worker program.

The suit, certified as a class action in September, seeks to collect unpaid wages on behalf of tree planters who earned substantially less than minimum wage, were denied overtime pay and had to pay for their own tools, visas and travel expenses, in violation of federal law.
The lawsuit is one of several that the Center has filed in its campaign to reform the nation’s flawed guest worker program, which could be greatly expanded under various proposals in Congress.
http://www.splcenter.org/legal/news/art ... gen-112006

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