Subpoena... received for myself and 3 employees.

[mcvickj]

Seems pretty simple to me. If you want to get paid you go to work. If you are not working you don't get paid. Why do you have to pay their wages if they aren't working at the store?

Last time I checked avoiding a subpoena isn't a good idea. So the employee will need to take the day off to make an appearance. Just have them make the hours up later in the week if that is possible.

 

[Exterous]

This isn't in CA but I was subpoenaed for a court case when my company was being sued. I got reimbursed for my time there. As an employee of that store, they would not sue you but would sue the store - so unless you're the owner I doubt you have anything to worry about. If its a pre-lim hearing then I would say it would take a most a day.
But all of the above is based on very limited experience in being subpoenaed

 

[tyler811]

Originally posted by: masterxfob
this past sunday, i had an incident where a black male was causing a disturbance at my business. the guy was walking around and yelling at people, swinging some chain at an employee, and trying to grab another one by the arm. now, the guy didn't actually touch/hurt any of my employees, but they did call the police. the police came out and arrested the guy, and then got the names of the 3 employees that were working at the time. afterwards my employees called to let me know what had occurred and i also received a phone call from the police.

wednesday i received the subpoena's for appearance of witness for myself and employees to a preliminary hearing. well, that's just great. monday happens to be a busy day for me and two of my employees happen to work as well.

now the problem is, i need to make a schedule for next week, but i can't rightly do so without knowing how many days this crap is going to take. i've tried calling the deputy district attorney in charge of the case but she never picks up. i've left 4 messages (wednesday afternoon and early evening, and thursday morning and afternoon), and have yet to receive a return phone call.

if i just leave the 3 employees off the schedule for the entire week, i'm going to be looking at paying their wages, plus 100+ hours of overtime. not exactly something i want to do as it will be quite costly. is there anything i can legally do about this? can i sue the city? file a complaint?

Sue the city for doing its job on prosecuting a some idiot whos waving a chain in your workplace and your employees called the police. Preliminary hearings usually dont last a week. In Mich employers only pay part of the wages not covered by what the court pays. Example courts pays your employee $32 the you make up the difference. Why would you pay them overtime if they did not work it.

DA's are busy as sh!t trying to keep the criminals off the street that wave chains in peoples place of employment. :roll:

So why would you want sue the city for doing its job after your employees called the police :roll:

What the h3ll difference does it make if he is black or white or asian. That is a non factor. Some guy came in waving a chain being a threat in your workplace. Now if it was an alien (not the illegal kind either) then you could put "OMG a martian guy came into my workplace waving a chain......"

:disgust::roll:

 

[tyler811]

Originally posted by: SonnyDaze
You and your employees need some lessons in self defense, so the next time some sh*t like this happens, you can grab the mvtherfvcker and throw him out of your business yourself, instead of having to call the police.

Yay then you can judo chop those half dozen bullets flying at you into the ground.

 

[zixxer]

Originally posted by: tyler811

Originally posted by: masterxfob
this past sunday, i had an incident where a black male was causing a disturbance at my business. the guy was walking around and yelling at people, swinging some chain at an employee, and trying to grab another one by the arm. now, the guy didn't actually touch/hurt any of my employees, but they did call the police. the police came out and arrested the guy, and then got the names of the 3 employees that were working at the time. afterwards my employees called to let me know what had occurred and i also received a phone call from the police.

wednesday i received the subpoena's for appearance of witness for myself and employees to a preliminary hearing. well, that's just great. monday happens to be a busy day for me and two of my employees happen to work as well.

now the problem is, i need to make a schedule for next week, but i can't rightly do so without knowing how many days this crap is going to take. i've tried calling the deputy district attorney in charge of the case but she never picks up. i've left 4 messages (wednesday afternoon and early evening, and thursday morning and afternoon), and have yet to receive a return phone call.

if i just leave the 3 employees off the schedule for the entire week, i'm going to be looking at paying their wages, plus 100+ hours of overtime. not exactly something i want to do as it will be quite costly. is there anything i can legally do about this? can i sue the city? file a complaint?

Sue the city for doing its job on prosecuting a some idiot whos waving a chain in your workplace and your employees called the police. Preliminary hearings usually dont last a week. In Mich employers only pay part of the wages not covered by what the court pays. Example courts pays your employee $32 the you make up the difference. Why would you pay them overtime if they did not work it.

DA's are busy as sh!t trying to keep the criminals off the street that wave chains in peoples place of employment. :roll:

So why would you want sue the city for doing its job after your employees called the police :roll:

What the h3ll difference does it make if he is black or white or asian. That is a non factor. Some guy came in waving a chain being a threat in your workplace. Now if it was an alien (not the illegal kind either) then you could put "OMG a martian guy came into my workplace waving a chain......"

:disgust::roll:

IMO stating the guy was black is normal. It's just part of what happened - don't be pissed off because the guy was black.


Also, I believe he's being sued by the black guy that caused the disturbance... or no?

 

[sixone]

Originally posted by: spidey07

Originally posted by: kranky
What do you think a preliminary hearing is? They are only going to determine if there is enough evidence to justify going forward with the criminal proceedings. They are calling the OP and the other employees as witnesses. The judge will likely ask the arresting officer what the story was, ask the OP and the other people if the guy standing there was the one they saw, then issue a ruling. Then a trial date is set for some time in the future.

That's it. What makes you think the OP needs to be fearful?

OP's words are on record. If he's smart he'll talk to an attorney. What he thinks are harmless accounts of events are just more fuel for the lawsuit that is sure to come.

To be used against him in a civil suit of some kind. He needs to seek legal help ASAP and never say anything about this incident to anybody. Let alone the internet.

-edit-
Just to pound this in to others reading the thread.....DON'T SAY CRAP TO ANYBODY WITHOUT ATTORNEY PRESENT.

OP - I hope you'll weigh this advice against the risk to your business if this bozo isn't charged with and convicted of a crime. Your employees already had a conflict with him, and got him some time in a police car in handcuffs - if not jail time.

If you don't do everything you can to get him locked up for the maximum amount of time, he will very likely be back to inflict more damage. Which he may do later anyway - what do you want to do to prevent it?

And I think you're right to pay your employees to defend your business in court. It's a tough spot for you.

 

[waggy]

wow what a thread.

sue the city? bwhahahahaha damn.

ok i do not understand how you come to paying wages and 100hrs of overtime. if they are off the schedule they shouldnt get paid.


yeah i think filling a complaint is a good idea. also go to the local precient and tell them you are pissed the cops did this. go complain a LOT

 

[masterxfob]

pretty much what i expected from ATOT, some good advice, some bad advice, and just some asinine replies.

now let's settle one thing for the extremely intelligent people here. regardless of whether or not i pay my employees for their time in court, i am going to need to replace their hours with other employees who are already working full time. anything over 8 hours a day and 40 hours a week constitutes overtime, and i don't have many part time employees. which means i will need to give more hours to the ones already working full time, get it? i know it's tough, but i hope i didn't lose any of you.

secondly, anything that i've already posted was what the officer told me when handing me the subpoena. i didn't see anything as i was not at the store when it happened, and my employees just gave me a drab version of what happened. i'm not a lawyer, but i somehow doubt what the officer told me can be used against me.

next, i'm not arguing that the DA's and officers have a tough job, but that doesn't give them the right to make mine harder. by not properly informing me of how things are going to proceed, and how much time off i will need to give to my employees, they are creating an unfair financial burden.

finally, if any of you really think that i shouldn't be paying my employees for going to court for something that occurred at work, i really doubt any of you would make it in management or in running a small business. by going to court as witnesses, they are protecting themselves, their coworkers, and the business. if after doing all of that, and i refused to pay them, why would they want to work for me?

 

[masterxfob]

and just to clear things up, the black guy is being held for a criminal case and we were subpoenaed as witnesses.

 

[smack Down]

Have you tried calling the court house to see if they can tell you how long the hearing is scheduled for?

edit: I would be surprised if it last more the an hour.

 

[FallenHero]

Originally posted by: masterxfob
and just to clear things up, the black guy is being held for a criminal case and we were subpoenaed as witnesses.

Like others have said...schedule them for the rest of the week, and give them that day to go to court. It rarely happens that a court case would go back to back to back. The court dockets are made at least a couple days in advance when it comes to that. You should be fine with just 1 day off. If you require anything more, then ask for volunteers for overtime for the next day that is needed. If no one volunteers, then you either work short staffed or schedule another person anyway. You gotta make a call on this one, AT can't do it for you.

 

[masterxfob]

i've called and left messages for the deputy district attorney that is handling the case and have yet to receive a phone call. the city wants me to help them prosecute a guy, but they won't help me out by answering any of my questions

 

[BoomerD]

DEFINITELY check with a good attorney on this. You MAY indeed be required to pay the employee's wages for this, since it IS work related.

 

[masterxfob]

Originally posted by: FallenHero
It rarely happens that a court case would go back to back to back. The court dockets are made at least a couple days in advance when it comes to that. You should be fine with just 1 day off.

i have no idea how the legal system works as i've never been in this type of situation, so that actually helped. thanks :thumbsup:

 

[FallenHero]

Originally posted by: masterxfob
i've called and left messages for the deputy district attorney that is handling the case and have yet to receive a phone call. the city wants me to help them prosecute a guy, but they won't help me out by answering any of my questions

Our entire legal system needs a swift kick in the pants, thats for sure. No amount of you calling is going to speed that up...just prepare for the court date and do your best givin the limited amount of information you have.

 

[masterxfob]

Originally posted by: BoomerD
DEFINITELY check with a good attorney on this. You MAY indeed be required to pay the employee's wages for this, since it IS work related.

that was never really an issue, i plan on paying my employees a full day for every day they are in court. you know what they say, a happy employee is a productive employee.

 

[BoomerD]

:thumbsup:
Thanks for being a decent boss...