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Chinese couple sues employers
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Posted on Apr 14 2005
A Chinese couple yesterday sued their employer couple, whom they accused of unlawfully assessing recruitment fees for their employment on Saipan and nonpayment of overtime.
The employers, Shao Pu Zhang and Guo Zheu, allegedly collected $5,500 each from Yang Xiang Nong and Li Jin Yun, whom they recruited from China.
The employers allegedly assured the workers that they would be employed for three years as cooks in exchange for paying the recruitment fees.
The workers’ lawyer, Loren Sutton, said that his clients even sold their house in China to accept the employment offer on Saipan.
Sutton said the workers worked for one-and-a-half years for the defendants. Shao then allegedly forced the workers to write letters of resignation.
The workers failed to find another employer and had filed labor complaints against the defendants. Sutton accused the defendants of breach of contract for failing to honor their oral promise of three years’ employment.
Sutton also said the workers only got compensated at a flat rate of $500 monthly during the duration of their employment and were never paid overtime.
He asked the court to award overtime pay to the workers and reimburse them $11,000, the amount that Guo had asked them when they were recruited to work on Saipan.
