November 21, 2001/ The New York Times: Greengrocers to Pay $315,000 in Back Wages : By STEVEN GREENHOUSE

acing charges that they paid workers less than $3 an hour, three greengrocers in Lower Manhattan agreed yesterday to pay $315,000 in back wages to 31 workers to settle a lawsuit brought by State Attorney General Eliot L. Spitzer.

Mr. Spitzer filed the lawsuit 18 months ago, charging the greengrocers with violating minimum wage and overtime laws while requiring many employees to work 54 to 84 hours a week.

These produce stores, state officials said, sometimes paid just $2.61 an hour even though the federal minimum wage is $5.15 an hour and overtime laws require paying at least one-and-a-half times that amount for all hours worked over 40 per week.

Mr. Spitzer said the back pay settlement, the largest reached among the city's greengrocers, should go far to pressure the city's 2,000 greengrocers to comply with wage and hour laws.

"This was the litmus test case," he said. "More important than the $315,000 is that these defendants, these owners, had been the most vocal opposition to our industrywide effort to get greengrocers to abide by labor law mandates. They were the folks who were saying, `We will not comply.' Settling this case and getting these workers full back wages is critical to demonstrate that we will continue with this effort."

Mr. Spitzer announced the settlement yesterday at a news conference at the Mexican Consulate because almost all the greengrocers' employees are Mexican immigrants, many of them illegal immigrants. ........Continue