In the Book of James, Chapter 5, Verse 4 of my copy of the Oxford Annotated Bible, New Revised Standard Version, I've read:
Listen! The wages of the laborers who mowed your fields, which you kept back by fraud, cry out, and the cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord of hosts.
This verse came to mind when I read a press release emailed this morning by the Minnesota Attorney General's office.
At the Minnesota Reformer, labor reporter and deputy editor Max Nesterak tells the story.
Minnesota dairy farm faces $3 million wage theft lawsuit involving hundreds of workers
By Max NesterakMinnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison filed one of the largest wage theft cases in his office’s history on Monday against Evergreen Acres Dairy, alleging the company robbed hundreds of immigrant workers of at least $3 million in wages while taking even more from their paychecks for squalid, overcrowded housing.
“I’m outraged, and I’m upset that they’ve gotten away with it for so long,” Ellison said during a news conference.
The dairy farm, owned by Keith Schaefer and his daughter Megan Hill, regularly shaved 12 to 32 hours from each two week paycheck and did not pay overtime premiums, Ellison said. Workers also said they weren’t paid for the first two weeks they worked and never received their final paychecks.
In an attempt to hide its violations, Evergreen Acres Dairy did not keep employment records required by law, destroyed timecards and falsified records, according to the complaint.
Schaefer and Hill could not be reached for comment.
The details of the complaint read like they were ripped from Upton Sinclair’s “The Jungle” or George Orwell’s “Down and Out in Paris and London”: Some employees who worked 12-hour day shifts shared the same bed with others who worked 12-hour night shifts, and they had their wages automatically deducted for rent.
Workers lived in garages, barns and other buildings unfit for human habitation. Some lived with bedrooms and bathrooms covered in mold, while others didn’t even have toilets.
When one employee did not report to work because of an injury, Schaefer allegedly “grabbed him by his neck, pushed him against the wall, and told him that if he didn’t go to work, he had to leave Evergreen within 10 minutes.”
Another employee was fired for taking a day off to go to a clinic after he got chemicals in his eyes while on the job, according to the complaint.
Schaefer allegedly threatened to kill one employee and reminded the workers of a dog he recently killed while he told other employees — many of whom are undocumented immigrants — that he would call the police on them.
“This isn’t some dystopian fiction. This isn’t ‘The Jungle’ describing the meatpacking industry 100 years ago in Chicago. This is Minnesota. This is Minnesota right now,” Ellison said.
Dairy farms are among the most dangerous workplaces in the country, relying on immigrant labor and facing little oversight from regulators, as ProPublica has detailed in a series of investigations.
Evergreen Acres is a sprawling dairy operation, running 18 facilities across central Minnesota and employing hundreds of workers. Workers clocked as many as 168 hours in a two-week period, earning between $12.50 to $17.50 an hour for grueling farm work until the company switched workers to a “salary,” according to the complaint.
Those workers were also tenants of the company, although they were not provided with lease agreements and were often shuffled around to various houses without notice, according to the complaint.
Undocumented workers who are victims of labor rights violations may be protected from deportation under a Biden administration policy. Ellison said his office is coordinating with the Department of Homeland Security to protect the workers for coming forward as witnesses of the abuse.
Ellison said criminal charges against Evergreen Acres owners and managers could follow but noted his office doesn’t have original jurisdiction, which lies with the county prosecutors where the alleged abuse took place. He declined to say if his office is coordinating with prosecutors in Stearns or Redwood counties.
Minnesota’s wage theft penalties are among the strongest in the country, with offenders potentially facing felony charges and prison time. Yet since the law was passed in 2019, few people have been criminally charged.
Ellison has made enforcing wage theft laws a central focus of his administration. He created a wage theft unit in 2019 and was able to double its size with additional funding approved by the Legislature in 2023. His unit has also brought cases against the Target-owned delivery service Shipt, construction subcontractors, and a major property management company.
During Monday’s news conference, Ellison emphasized that wage theft hurts not just the victims but other businesses.
“You should be able to play by the rules and not be undercut and have your market share taken away by a business who cuts the corners and treats people poorly,” Ellison said.
At one farm, workers lived in a converted barn that was invested with cockroaches. The “kitchen sink” was a utility sink next to a water heater.
Some worker housing had widespread microbial growth and mildew. Photos from civil complaint.
This Minnesota Reformer article is republished online under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.
Photo at top: Attorney General Keith Ellison announces a lawsuit against subcontractor Property Maintenance and Construction for obstructing an investigation by state officials into workers’ claims of wage theft on Oct. 25, 2022. Photo by Max Nesterak/Minnesota Reformer.
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