Grocery employees at a pair of Florida supermarkets got underpaid by $901,625 by management that also committed child labor violations, the U.S. Department of Labor announced.
Labor said 75 employees at Sarasota’s La Primavera Supermarket & Restaurant and Fort Pierce’s La Primavera Grocery Store will get that money, which averages $12,021.67 per worker.
Bradenton’s Juan Esquivel and Neida Esquivel own and run the La Primavera stores, according to state records and Neida Esquivel’s LinkedIn page. Juan Esquivel returned a Miami Herald phone message Tuesday but declined to comment.
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Wage and Hour Division investigators found that La Primavera slotted employees as exempt from overtime pay, even though those employees didn’t act as managers in directing full-time employees work; have managerial hiring and firing powers; or make a salary of at least $684 per week. This violates the overtime pay parts of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA).