[Other articles below, plus more on Wal-Mart]
Jury awards $172 mil to Wal-Mart workers Wal-Mart lawsuit plaintiffs from left James Davis, Charlotte Johnson, and Jerrilyn Newland listen as attorney Jessica L. Grant, right, of the Furth Firm talks to them outside of a courtroom in Oakland, Calif., Monday, Sept. 19, 2005. Associated Press file photo by Jeff Chiu |
Jurors in Oakland, Calif., Thursday awarded $172 million to thousands of Wal-Mart Stores Inc. employees after deciding that the world's largest retailer violated state law by denying lunch breaks, a court spokesman said.
Jurors in Alameda County Superior Court awarded $57 million in actual damages and $115 in punitive damages in the class action lawsuit filed in 2001.
Jessica Grant, a lawyer for the plaintiffs, spoke to Reuters after the ruling. "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 said in a statement to CNNMoney.com that it will appeal the ruling. "During the trial, a California court of appeals made a ruling in another case (Murphy v. Kenneth Cole) that directly supports Wal-Mart's position that the meal-period premiums in question are penalties, rather than wages. This means that punitive damages cannot be recovered in this case. In short, California law prohibits penalties on top of penalties."
Wal-Mart also claims to have addressed the problem by "adopting new technology that sends alerts to cashiers when it is time for their meal breaks. The system will automatically shut down registers if the cashier does not respond."
— from staff and wire reports.
source: http://money.cnn.com/2005/12/22/news/fortune500/wal-mart_damages/ 22dec2005
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If you worked for Wal-Mart at any time since December 26, 1998, you may have legal claims in a class action sex discrimination lawsuit against Wal-Mart. Si Ud. desea información en Español sobre esta demanda de la acción de clase contra Wal-Mart, por favor llámenos al (800) 839-4372. |
OAKLAND, Calif. — A California jury on Thursday awarded $207 million to thousands of employees at Wal-Mart Stores Inc. who claimed they were illegally denied lunch breaks.
The world's largest retailer was ordered to pay $57 million in general damages and $150 million in punitive damages to about 116,000 current and former California employees for violating a 2001 state law that requires employers to give 30-minute, unpaid lunch breaks to employees who work at least six hours.
The class-action lawsuit in Alameda County Superior Court is one of about 40 nationwide alleging workplace violations by Wal-Mart, and the first to go to trial. The Bentonville, Ark.-based retailer, which earned $10 billion last year, settled a similar lawsuit in Colorado for $50 million.
In the California suit, Wal-Mart had claimed that workers did not demand penalty wages on a timely basis. Under the law, the company must pay workers a full hour's wages for every missed lunch.
The company also said it paid some employees their penalty pay and, in 2003, most workers agreed to waive their meal periods as the law allows.
The lawsuit covers former and current employees in California from 2001 to 2005. The workers claimed they were owed more than $66 million plus interest, and sought damages to punish the company for alleged wrongdoing.
The lawsuit was filed by several former Wal-Mart employees in the San Francisco Bay area in 2001. It took four years of legal wrangling to get to trial.
Wal-Mart (NYSE: WMT) is in trouble again. Only this time, the allegations are all trash. In a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Tuesday, the company disclosed that it is the subject of a criminal investigation into how it handles certain types of hazardous waste, including hair spray and charcoal.
At issue is how Wal-Mart used its own trucks to transport the materials, instead of vehicles certified to carry hazardous waste. In doing so, the company may have violated the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act. The U.S. Attorney's office in Los Angeles is leading the investigation.
Before you type that email bemoaning the Feds sticking it to Wal-Mart, consider that this marks the second time in less than 45 days that the company has been involved in a high-profile law enforcement action. The last one, in mid-November, featured the arrest of 120 workers on immigration violations.
And don't forget a long-standing class action suit that accuses it of discriminating against women employees in terms of salary and advancement.
Wal-Mart hasn't formally answered the latest charges. But a company spokesman gave a modest defense by telling Reuters that the government wasn't challenging the way it disposes of waste, only how it transports it.
Look, I'm not going to bash Wal-Mart. After all, the retailer has developed a superior business that has provided investors with generous returns over decades. But at some point, the flood of lawsuits will raise fundamental questions. Here are two: Just how far does Wal-Mart go to deliver rock-bottom prices? And are those practices legally sustainable? The anecdotal evidence suggests these lawsuits won't be a serious threat to Wal-Mart, but I suspect it will be some time before we know for sure.
source: http://www.fool.com/News/mft/2005/mft05122120.htm 22dec2005
An American county jury awarded more than $US207 million ($283.17 million) to thousands of employees at Wal-Mart Stores Inc who claimed they were illegally denied lunch breaks.
The world's largest retailer was ordered to pay $US57 million ($77.98 million) in general damages and $US150 million ($205.2 million) in punitive damages to about 116,000 current and former California employees for violating a state law requiring employers to give 30-minute, unpaid lunch breaks to employees who work at least six hours.
The class-action lawsuit in Alameda County Superior Court is one of about 40 in the United States alleging workplace violations by Wal-Mart, and the first to go to trial.
The Bentonville, Arkansas-based retailer, which earned $US10 billion ($13.68 billion) last year, settled a similar lawsuit in Colorado for $US50 million ($68.4 million).
In the California suit, Wal-Mart had claimed that workers did not demand penalty wages on a timely basis. Under the law, the company must pay workers a full hour's wages for every missed lunch.
The company also said it paid some employees their penalty pay and, in 2003, most workers agreed to waive their meal periods as the law allows.
The lawsuit covers former and current employees in California from 2001 to 2005.
The workers claimed they were owed more than $US66 million ($90.29 million) plus interest, and sought damages to punish the company for alleged wrongdoing.
The lawsuit was filed by several former Wal-Mart employees in the San Francisco Bay area in 2001. It took four years of legal wrangling to get to trial.
AP
source: http://www.smh.com.au/news/business/walmarts-big-payout-over-lost-lunch-breaks/2005/12/23/1135032164261.html 22dec2005
An Alameda County jury awarded $172 million today to thousands of current and former Wal-Mart employees who claimed the retail giant illegally deprived them of lunch breaks.
Wal-Mart must pay $57 in general damages and $115 million in punitive damages to about 116,000 employees, the jury ruled after a four-month trial in a class-action lawsuit.
The jury found that the world's largest retailer violated a 2001 state law that requires employers to give 30-minute, unpaid lunch breaks to employees who work at least six hours.
"I'm very, very pleased by the verdict," said Fred Furth, a San Francisco attorney who represented the plaintiffs. The verdict has "made an example of Wal-Mart," proving that "you can't come into the state of California and violate its laws."
Neal Manne, a Houston attorney who represented Wal-Mart, said the retailer expected to appeal. He said the lawsuit arose from "some compliance problems."
"The problems have long been resolved," Manne said. "There is 100 percent compliance now."
The majority of the jurors declined comment outside court, but one panelist said the facts of the case made it clear that all companies, including Wal-Mart, must obey state law.
"In work places like Wal-Mart, where it's non-union, state law is the only protection that a lot of workers have for basic rights, like meal breaks and getting their breaks on time," said the juror, who declined to give his name.
The lawsuit was filed in 2002 but didn't go trial before Superior Court Judge Ronald Sabraw until September. Jurors deliberated for less than three days.
source: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2005/12/22/MNG1RGC5F437.DTL&type=printable 22dec2005
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