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Worker was paid with 91,500 oily pennies: feds. Now company owes him much more
- denkmoon 3y agoAlways nice to see a feel-good story on HN
- al2o3cr 3y agoAre we sure it was "oil" on those pennies? o_O https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f9aM_dT5VMI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f9aM_dT5VMI
- fnordpiglet 3y agohttps://archive.is/rZVMi https://archive.is/rZVMi
- jgeada 3y agoOdd, if a worker had stolen that much money from the business they’d likely be looking at jail time, not just being asked to pay it back.
- gliixo 3y agoSeriously these fucks need to start seeing the inside of a cell
- staplers 3y agoAs with police, the law prioritizes property, commerce, and order.
- hapless 3y agoPolice exist to enforce a notion of "order" based on extremely specific notions of property and class relations That said, I am not seeing the relevance to the originally posted article. This is an example of the law actually working against the structures police forces were created to enforce
- NikkiA 3y agoOr to put it another way, the police exist to ensure everyone knows their place, and stays in their lane.
- ars 3y agoYou have to prove it was stolen, not just a mistake, miscalculation, accident, lost mail, and a blizzard of other possibilities. You can't just "know it", you have to prove it.
- clipsy 3y agoJudging by how easily shoplifters are convicted, it would appear you can just "know it" when the crime is property theft. No one gets off the hook by claiming they "accidentally" stuffed a bunch of expensive goods in their coat and walked out the door; no one should get off the hook by claiming they "accidentally" refused to pay their employees.
- Brigand 3y agoWhere do you live that shoplifters are easily convicted?
- cheeetohs 3y agoThe trouble is that, much like identity theft, wage theft isn’t theft, nor is it much alike to theft. It’s still bad of course (worse than property theft). You aren’t proving that a physical item that should be in one location has in fact been moved to another. You’re proving that the reason some dollars haven’t been moved from one place to another is that the perpetrator intended to withhold those dollars. That could be changed though. Criminalize the simple fact of underpayment, as opposed to requiring intent, and I imagine wage theft would rates would go down? …But beware unintended consequences. You don’t necessarily want to throw the neighborhood baker into jail because she bounced a paycheck.
- dTal 3y agoTheft of a physical object must also be intentional. Wage theft is very much alike to theft, although it would be more properly termed "labor theft".
- ajhurliman 3y agoI thought this was sarcasm at first but I’m genuinely not sure now: Do you truly believe shoplifters are easily and often prosecuted, let alone convicted? Personally, I’ve never seen or heard of a single person have any repercussions for shoplifting, and I’ve seen a _lot_ of shoplifting in Seattle.
- tptacek 3y agoThe website for his business today says "Yes, we accept pennies" (improved from "Yes, nitwits, we accept pennies"), but charges a 10% processing fee for them. The whole case is mostly on CourtListener. The owner was fined not just for the pennies, but for willfully refusing to pay his employees for hours (and OT) worked. Compounding his problems, he attempted to represent himself pro se, in a case brought by the Secretary of Labor. He (and, I think, later, his attorney) got sanctioned for trying to obstruct discovery. The last motion filed in the case before the verdict against him was him attempting to fire his attorney. He may have gotten off lightly. The pennies, I guess I'm saying, might not have much to do with what happened.
- notjulianjaynes 3y agoCertainly got off easy, assuming there isn't a separate forthcoming case for the defamatory messages posted about the former employee. From the DOJ release: >The court ordered the auto shop operator to pay $39,934, representing back wages owed and an equal amount in liquidated damages, to nine workers. If I'm understanding that correctly, the person paid in pennies is owed a whopping $1,830.
- empyrrhicist 3y ago> “What started out as a gotcha to a subpar ex-employee, sure got a lot of press…Let us just say that maybe he stole? Maybe he killed a dog? Maybe he killed a cat? Maybe he was lazy? Maybe he was a butcher? . . . know that no one would go to the trouble we did to make a point with out [sic] being motivated.” So... is the slander case coming next?
- rcme 3y agoThis would be libel
- empyrrhicist 3y agoYou're right, I was picturing them saying it.
- hapless 3y agoA "bad" worker who you are happy to see go is still entitled to all of his pay. In the article, the business owners keep suggesting that it was bad performance, or a bad attitude, or something like that, that justifies this behavior. But, factually, both as a matter of law and custom, nothing justifies this. If a fellow works for you on an agreed rate, you are obliged to pay him. If you are not, ultimately, happy with an employee, that doesn't mean you get to keep his last paycheck.
- Dylan16807 3y ago> If a fellow works for you on an agreed rate, you are obliged to pay him. If you are not, ultimately, happy with an employee, that doesn't mean you get to keep his last paycheck. That still suggests a circumstance (the fellow not in fact working) where you could withhold the paycheck, but I don't think such a withholding is generally possible.
- hapless 3y ago1. that fact is not disputed in the article 2. hours worked, and "working," have legal meaning, which, again, is not disputed by either party in america, if you contract with a fellow to work, and you find the work unsuitable, you can discharge him quite easily. but you still owe him his wages!
- josephcsible 3y agoIf "employer", "employee", and "wages" were replaced with "tenant", "landlord", and "rent", respectively, would the same still hold? If not, why not?
- Sanzig 3y agoI'm not sure what point you're trying to make here. Non-payment of rent is a straightforward sure-fire cause for eviction practically everywhere. Even jurisdictions that allow a tenant to withhold rent to cover things like emergency repairs usually require a ruling from the housing tribunal to do so.
- pfdietz 3y agoI suspect the employer also violated laws about oil disposal. You can't just dump it on the ground, on pennies or otherwise.
- hapless 3y agoThe story comes from the Macon paper. Georgia has very clear guidelines around oil disposal! https://epd.georgia.gov/document/document/used-oil-guidance-used-oil-brochure/download https://epd.georgia.gov/document/document/used-oil-guidance-...
- chris_wot 3y agoWhat are defamation laws like in the States? Because it does appear that the sign on the door is defamatory.
- notjulianjaynes 3y agoIanal but I imagine it wouldn't be too difficult to argue that the passage quoted in the article qualifies as defamation per se. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_defamation_law#Defamation_per_se https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_defamation_law...
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]