Minnesota Attorney General Files Wage Theft Lawsuit Against Stearns County Dairy Farm

(KNSI) – Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison has filed a lawsuit against a Stearns County dairy farm alleging Evergreen Acres Dairy, Evergreen Estates, Morgan Feedlots, and the dairy operations’ owners of engaging in wage theft.

In the suit, filed in Stearns County District Court, it says Keith Schaefer and Megan Hill “deprived its vulnerable, low-wage dairy employees of millions of dollars in wages they earned by shaving both regular and overtime hours from workers’ paychecks, not paying wages owed at the beginning and end of workers’ employment, and by unlawfully deducting rent for substandard onsite housing that fails to meet standards of habitability under Minnesota law.”

The suit also accuses Evergreen of employing hundreds of people over the last three years, many of whom are unauthorized workers from Mexico who speak little English. He says they work 12 hour shifts at least six days a week and have done so for so long due to “systematically underreporting the number of hours that employees work on their paystubs, often shaving off 12 to 32 hours from each two-week pay period and depriving employees of both regular wages and overtime premiums owed.”

Ellison further alleges Evergreen attempted to cover up its illegal practices by refusing to document most of its employment practices in writing, which is against the law; failing to provide employees with written information about how they are paid, which is also required by law; falsifying paystubs; and even destroying the timecards that they are required to keep by law that would show how many hours its employees actually worked.

Evergreen also stands accused of acting as landlord to its employees and making unauthorized deductions from its employees’ paychecks for the “substandard housing it leases to them.”

Ellison says Evergreen’s employee housing “violates Minnesota’s most basic health and safety standards.” For example, he says some workers live in windowless “bedrooms” with plywood walls, unfinished electrical sockets, and only space heaters for warmth. According to Ellison, some employees live in housing with no onsite toilet, while other workers have lived in garages, haphazardly converted barns, and other buildings unsuitable for human habitation.

Court documents say Evergreen violated tenants’ privacy rights by conducting unannounced inspections and punished employees based on those inspections by taking money from their wages.

Ellison alleges Paynesville-based Evergreen owes its employees at least $3 million in earned and unpaid wages. The lawsuit also asks for liquidated damages, civil penalties, costs, and attorney’s fees.

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