2 Suits Target Conditions at Garment Factories

Immigrant workers who made name-brand clothes labored in sweatshop conditions, working long hours without overtime pay for far less than minimum wage, two lawsuits filed Thursday allege.

The suits, filed in federal court, name as defendants trendy fashion house BCBG Maxazria, of Los Angeles, and clothing labels City Girl, based in Commerce, and Hobby Horse, a Chino company. Also named are the Los Angeles-area sewing contractors who were the plaintiffs’ actual employers.

In one suit, plaintiff Hsiu-Chu Chen said sewing contractor Angelique & Co. of Walnut paid her about $3 per hour and required her to work 10-hour days, six days a week, without any overtime pay.

“The supervisors were like guards pacing among the workers to make sure we never stopped working,” Chen said Thursday through a translator.

BCBG, which contracted with Angelique to sew its clothing, said the lawsuits are unfounded, and that it is “firmly committed to upholding the legal rights of employees and complies with all [labor] laws.”

In the second case, three members of the same family say they were illegally fired after they complained about working conditions at Unique Sewing in Chinatown. Samuel Guerra, Graciela Ceja and their daughter, Lorena Guerra, say they also worked long days for less than minimum wage without overtime pay.

Lawyer Muneer Ahmad, who is with the Asian Pacific American Legal Center, said the four plaintiffs are representative of the approximately 150,000 garment workers in the Los Angeles area, many of whom work in sweatshop conditions.