SACRAMENTO — A group of former employees allege they were not paid overtime by their employer and have filed suit.
Lucaria Tenorio, Francisco Viera, Abel Miranda, Pascuala Saucedo, Cristino Santiago, Lucia Torres, Antonio Torres, Teresa Miranda, Irma Castaneda, Ezequiel Aguilar, Maria Teresa, Carlos Pedro, Artemio Santiago and Maria De Jesus filed a complaint on Feb. 29 in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California against Gabriel Gallardo Sr., Manuel Gallardo, Silvia Esther Gallardo, Kern County Cultivation Inc. and Nazar Kooner, alleging that the defendants failed to properly compensate employees.
According to the complaint, the plaintiffs allege that between 2014 and 2015, they worked for more than 40 hours per work week without being paid any overtime compensation. The plaintiffs hold the defendants responsible because the defendants allegedly provided misleading information to the plaintiffs regarding the terms of their employment and allegedly failed to pay them any overtime wages along with providing an itemized wage statement.
The plaintiffs request a trial by jury and seek compensatory damages plus interest, restitution, liquidated damages, all other damages and injunctive relief, all legal fees and any other relief as the court deems just. They are represented by Marco A. Palau, Hector R. Martinez, Stan S. Mallison, Eric S. Trabucco and Joseph D. Sutton of Mallison & Martinez in Oakland and Cynthia L. Rice, Michael Meuter and Sahar Durali of California Rural Legal Assistance Inc. in Oakland, Salinas and Delano.
U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California case number 1:16-cv-00283-DAD-JLT