Pacoima Employer Must Pay Workers or Face Jail Term

A former Pacoima clothing manufacturer pleaded no contest Thursday to 39 criminal charges of failing to pay employees a total of more than $15,000 that they earned and was ordered to make full restitution or serve up to 19 1/2 years in jail.

Alberto Fuenzalida, 43, of San Fernando has 60 days to pay $15,457.76 to 39 former sewing-machine operators who were either underpaid or issued bad checks last December and January while working at now-defunct International Sportswear.

If Fuenzalida fails to turn the money over by Nov. 19 to the state’s Division of Labor Standards Enforcement, which will distribute the funds, he could be sentenced to up to 19 years and six months in County Jail and be fined up to $39,000.

3 Years’ Probation

In addition, Los Angeles Municipal Court Commissioner Beverly E. Mosley ordered that Fuenzalida be placed on three years’ probation. Fuenzalida’s no-contest plea is the legal equivalent of a guilty plea. Each of the 39 misdemeanor charges carries a maximum $1,000 fine and six months in jail.

‘This Was a Serious Crime’

The 19-year suspended jail sentence is one of the longest ever handed down in Los Angeles Municipal Court, according to Judge George W. Trammell, who presides over the court.

Mosley said after the proceeding that the long jail term may “seem rather onerous” but “this was a serious crime and many people were affected.”

Fuenzalida was charged last July with 44 counts of failing to pay minimum wages, issuing bad checks and violating sanitation codes in what the Los Angeles city attorney’s office called a “stereotypical sweatshop case.” It is believed to be the first such case filed against a clothing manufacturer in the San Fernando Valley.

Neither Fuenzalida nor his attorney, Rene Lopez de Arenoas Jr., could be reached for comment.

Five charges alleging sanitation violations in the bathrooms at Fuenzalida’s Bradley Avenue factory were dropped during plea bargaining, Deputy City Atty. Michael Guarino said.

“The main thing was to get the victims their money back in their pockets,” Guarino said. “They are the ones who had suffered for a better part of a year without money they had earned.”

Workers Banded Together

Most of the former employees are owed $200 to $400, but several are owed as much as $600. Several of them said previously that they were forced to sell personal belongings to pay bills and did not have enough food for their families during the two-month period they went without pay.

State labor officials said the case is unusual because 28 workers, angry that they were issued bad checks or not paid, banded together and filed a complaint. Throughout the summer months, more employees came forward and met with state investigators.

Becky Gaba, a church and community activist, said most of the workers are recent Latino immigrants who at first were skeptical that their complaints would be acted upon.

“Even though the bureaucracy requires a lot of patience, I think they learned that the system does work,” Gaba said.

Elizabeth Rodriguez, 29, a former employee who will receive $650 in back wages, said the ruling gives her and her co-workers a “great feeling of success.”

“After all the meetings and talking with officials, we wondered if we would ever get our money,” Rodriguez said. “But, by coming forward, we were successful. Now we can pay back our families for all the troubles this caused last year.”