In a bizarre incident, a restaurant in California hired a fake priest to extract confessions and sins from its employees, as per a report in CNN. The owner has now been asked to pay $140,000 (Rs 1.1 crore) back in wages and damages to employees in what is being regarded as "the most shameless act of corruption an employer has taken against its staff".
According to the US Department of Labour's press release, a former employee claimed that one of the owners of the restaurant named Taqueria Garibaldi hired a fake priest to hear confessions and "get the sins out", including asking employees if they had ever been late for work, stolen money from the restaurant or had "bad intentions" towards their employer. The owner, Che Garibaldi, runs two locations in northern California.
"Under oath, an employee of Taqueria Garibaldi explained how the restaurant offered a supposed priest to hear their workplace 'sins' while other employees reported that a manager falsely claimed that immigration issues would be raised by the department's investigation," the release stated.
The issue was then brought before Judge William B Shubb in the District Court for the Eastern District of California, who mandated that 35 workers be given back $140,000 in wages and damages from Che Garibaldi and other owners identified as Eduardo Hernandez, Hector Manual Martinez Galindo and Alejandro Rodriguez. The restaurant has also been asked to pay $5,000 (Rs 4 lakh) in civil penalties.
Investigators also discovered that the restaurant failed to pay its staff overtime bonus, and the owners threatened employees with retaliation and adverse immigration consequences for cooperating with the investigation. Further, they also fired one worker who they believed had complained to the Department of Labour.
"This employer's despicable attempts to retaliate against employees were intended to silence workers, obstruct an investigation and prevent the recovery of unpaid wages," the press release said.
The Sacramento Catholic Diocese confirmed the fake priest was connected to their diocese. "While we don't know who the person in question was, we are completely confident he was not a priest of the Diocese of Sacramento," a spokesman told the Catholic News Agency.
