Posted on 01/02/2018 9:58:20 AM PST by jeannineinsd
The deal the worker struck was simple: $150 a day to tile a bathroom and stucco the walls of a home in Arcadia. The pay was to come at the end of each day but never did, according to a lawsuit filed in Los Angeles County Superior Court by the California labor commissioner.
After six days with no pay, the lawsuit alleges, the worker finally confronted his boss, who then snapped, called him a “wetback” and threatened to report him to immigration authorities.
“Let me share something with you, not only am I [an ex]-sheriff, my family are all in the police department,” the lawsuit says the boss wrote in a follow-up text message after refusing to pay the worker. “You want to come to my job & create a issue, I will handcuff you take you into custody & wait for I.C.E to come take you in for felony threats.”
The employer could not be reached for comment, but the claim is increasingly common. Complaints over immigration-related retaliation threats surged last year in California, according to the Labor Commissioner’s Office. Through Dec. 22, workers had filed 94 immigration-related retaliation claims with the office, up from 20 in all of 2016 and only seven a year earlier.
The cases include instances in which employers allegedly threatened to report workers to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, after they raised issues over working conditions, including wage theft. Other allegations include employers demanding different documents than those required by federal immigration law or refusing to honor documents that appear genuine.
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
An important fact to emphasize is that both these parties in this business transaction are willfully operating outside of the law.
The illegal handyman most likely does not have a contractor's license, is not reporting the income on his state and federal tax return, does not maintain a business license, or pay any of the expenses associated with a legitimate business.
The homeowner was too cheap to pay a legitimate business to do the work, knowingly struck a deal with an illegal worker, and then was too cheap to pay the cash sum as agreed.
And now the taxpayers have to pay to sort it out! Both sides of this transaction were knowingly breaking the law, and not paying their fair share of the taxes to support the state's infrastructure of labor commission, courthouses, etc. But now the state's legal citizens and taxpayers are burdened with the cost of sorting out this illegal transaction.
Don’t they need tile work done in their own country? Bye! Have a nice trip!
Deport them all: workers and homeowners. Let Mexico sort it out.
“An important fact to emphasize is that both these parties in this business transaction are willfully operating outside of the law.”
Theoretically, yes.
But I don’t believe a word of it.
Pearl-clutching-and-hankies-at-ready-for-this-one PING
they are not workers, but illegal aliens.
that should be made clear.
They brought this on themselves by coming here illegally.
They are owed NOTHING.
From the article, it sounded to me like it wasn't the homeowner who refused to pay but the contractor refusing to pay him employee. It says his "boss" made the threat.
The U.S. needs to start a “Don’t Let This Happen To YOU!” advertising campaign high lighting horror stories about the unfortunate things that can happen to foreigners who invade our country illegally (especially stories of families being broken up by deportation).
The ads need to be put online, and also broadcast in as many problematic countries as possible.
Expel illegals and we wouldn’t have this secondary issue.
But that would mean an American tile worker would get his job back!
That said, if you are working in a country illegally, expect to be jacked around.
Beats the heck out of the management threats in Silicon Valley.
It all started in 2001 when upper management ordered 1st level managers to find anyway possible to give poor reviews to Americans so they could justify firing them and replacing them with India workers.
When my review came in in April 2002, my managers first question was....”Do you own a gun?”
It took me 5 years of working my butt off to clear my record.
Yes! Extra bonus points!
“In the example given, the homeowner should have paid the handyman the agreed amount. in turn, the handyman, once he was not paid the first day as agreed, should not have returned to work a second day...An important fact to emphasize is that both these parties in this business transaction are willfully operating outside of the law.”
Lawlessness (illegal handyman) begats lawlessness (illegal use and abuse of illegal handyman).
“An important fact to emphasize is that both these parties in this business transaction are willfully operating outside of the law.”
Yes, it’s just too bad we can’t deport both of them!
No knock raids and conspiracy charges against businesses that hire illegals will help all around.
If one is here legally, one does not have to feel threatened by empty words.
A friend of mine flips homes. She recently had a hispanic man redo a kitchen. She paid him, but he asked for more, citing cost overruns. She refused.
A day later she stopped by the house and the entire kitchen had been removed. The basement window was broken.
She reported the theft, and the cops tracked him down. The kitchen was in his garage. His girlfriend, a US citizen, confessed to the crime. Why?
He was an illegal.
The gf was arrested for breaking and entering and theft. He was also arrested, though my friend doesn’t know what became of him. (I’m in PA.)
I sense a pattern here.
RUN Jorge RUN!
I read the article. All we have is the handyman’s side of the story. What if he did a crappy job and was given six days to fix it? What if after six days he never did, and the homeowner refused to pay for a crappy job?
In the prior administration the handyman probably thought he had protection from Obama’a Justice Department. Ditto in California. Times are changing - at least in Washington.
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