- The FLDS church, polygamist Lyle Jeffs, and Brian Jessop are ordered to pay nearly $1 million in back wages and damages for violating child labor laws.
- The decision came after a 2012 video showing women and children harvesting pecans at a farm in southern Utah. The US Department of Labor filed a complaint accusing bishop Lyle Jeffs of illegally hiring the children.
- Lyle Jeffs has previously served time in federal prison for food stamp fraud and is brother to the infamous former FLDS leader Warren Jeffs, who got a life sentence for underage sex crimes.
Amy Simonson from CNN writes:
“(CNN)-A federal judge in Utah ordered the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (FLDS) and two of its affiliates to pay nearly $1 million for allegedly violating child labor laws when they employed minors on a ranch without paying them for years.
The decision comes after a 2012 video showed women and children working to harvest pecans at a farm in southern Utah. The US Department of Labor had filed a complaint, accusing bishop Lyle Jeffs and his business contractor, Brian Jessop, of illegally hiring the children.
U.S. District Court Judge Jill Parrish on Wednesday ordered Jeffs to pay $312,079.30 in back wages and $312,079.30 in damages, according to court documents. Another $281,336.32 in back wages were also ordered for Jeffs, Jessop and the church.
The U.S. Department of Labor alleged Paragon Contractors — the company Jessop ran at the time — used children from FLDS to work on the pecan farm without pay from 2008 to 2013, court documents from 2019 show…”
See full story here.
Categories: Business, Government, Labor, WTF?
Economic Left 
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