Calif. jury orders Wal-Mart to pay $172 mln...

[Zim Hosein]

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (WMT.N: Quote, Profile, Research) must pay $172 million in damages and compensation to about 116,000 current and former employees for denying meal breaks, a California jury ruled on Thursday.

Concluding a class-action court challenge against the world's biggest retailer, the Alameda County, California jury held that Wal-Mart had broken a state law on breaks for meals.

The ruling applies only to current and former Wal-Mart employees in California, said Chris Lebsock, an attorney for the plaintiffs.

The four plaintiffs who launched the lawsuit in 2001 had claimed Wal-Mart had failed to pay hourly employees for missed or interrupted meal breaks.

The jury ruled Wal-Mart must pay $57.2 million in compensation and $115 million in punitive damages, said Jessica Grant, another lawyer for the plaintiffs.

"What was compelling for the jury was that we put a lot of evidence before them of memos by Wal-Mart from seven years ago that concluded they had been breaking the law," said Grant. "Instead of taking steps to solve the problem, Wal-Mart concealed it."

Wal-Mart faces similar lawsuits in over 30 states, said Grant, whose firm is pressing two of the court challenges, one in Maryland and the other in Massachusetts, on behalf of 80,000 class-action plaintiffs.

Wal-Mart was not immediately available for comment.

© Reuters 2005. All Rights Reserved.

Calif. jury orders Wal-Mart to pay $172 mln

Don't Wal-Mart hourly associates punch in and out for lunch? 😕

 

[AStar617]

Slave labor FTW! 😕

 

[mugs]

Originally posted by: Zim Hosein
Don't Wal-Mart hourly associates punch in and out for lunch? 😕

If they punch out for lunch, wouldn't that mean they're breaking the state law that requires Walmart to pay them for their lunch break?

Edit: It sounds like what happened here is that Walmart was required to pay them for a certain amount of time for lunch, and if they spent less than that amount of time eating lunch because they were called back, they weren't paid for the full time.

 

[acemcmac]

Originally posted by: mugs

Originally posted by: Zim Hosein
Don't Wal-Mart hourly associates punch in and out for lunch? 😕

If they punch out for lunch, wouldn't that mean they're breaking the state law that requires Walmart to pay them for their lunch break?

Edit: It sounds like what happened here is that Walmart was required to pay them for a certain amount of time for lunch, and if they spent less than that amount of time eating lunch because they were called back, they weren't paid for the full time.

Right, but it's not that it's a paid lunch- It's an unpaid lunch were they were often forced to work during and either skip or cut it short without proper pay. I used to work somewhere where this was common.

 

[PlatinumGold]

seems to me justice was served.

you can't force someone to work for you when they aren't being paid.

 

[vital]

that's chump change for walmart

 

[KarenMarie]

punitive damages really suck.

 

[Zim Hosein]

Originally posted by: vital
that's chump change for walmart

True, but it is a start IMO.

 

[Zim Hosein]

TTT for Marlin1975 🙂

 

[salt9876]

Repostedddddd

 

[Remy XO]

So they get around $1400 each? woopoodoo. Actually they'll probably get half that paying for legal fees.