72 Ex-Garment Workers Win Back Pay, Damages

A federal judge has awarded $168,410 in back pay and damages to 72 former employees of a Los Angeles garment firm, ending more than five years of litigation, it was announced Thursday.

The workers are due $84,205 in back overtime pay and an equal amount of liquidated damages for violations by J.L. Fashions and its former owner, Joe H. Liu, said U.S. Department of Labor spokesman Joe Kirkbride. U.S. District Judge James Ideman ruled against Liu in 1986, but the business owner argued that the wages had been paid and took the case to the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, which sent the case back to trial.

On Jan. 29, Ideman found that Liu had not carried its “burden of producing credible evidence” that the wages had been paid and again awarded the sum to the workers, Kirkbride said. Meanwhile, J.L. Fashions has gone out of business, Kirkbride said, and Labor Department officials will seek the money from Liu.