Singh v. Jutla: Court Denies Motion to Dismiss in Retaliation Case Where Worker Was Reported to INS

IMMIGRANTS & EMPLOYMENT

Immigrants' Employment Rights and Remedies

SINGH V. JUTLA, ET AL.: COURT DENIES MOTION TO DISMISS IN RETALIATION CASE WHERE WORKER WAS REPORTED TO INS
Immigrants' Rights Update, Vol. 16, No. 6, October 21, 2002

A federal court in northern California has denied the defendants' motion to dismiss a federal retaliation lawsuit brought under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), rejecting their argument that the Supreme Court's decision in Hoffman Plastic Compounds v. NLRB, 122 S. Ct. 1275 (2002), barred the plaintiff's claim. The plaintiff in Singh v. Jutla, et al. filed this case after defendants reported him to the Immigration and Naturalization Service in retaliation for the plaintiff filing an underlying wage claim. The defendants' action resulted in the INS detaining the plaintiff for close to 16 months because he had an outstanding final order of removal or deportation.

In refusing to extend Hoffman to the present case, the court noted that the Hoffman Court reaffirmed its holding in Sure-Tan v. NLRB, 467 U.S. 883 (1984), that undocumented immigrants can be considered employees under the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA). The court also noted that case law before and after Hoffman has consistently held that the FLSA applies equally to all employees, regardless of immigration status. Moreover, in Hoffman the Supreme Court only barred back pay under the NLRA, and its decision did not preclude other traditional remedies, including declaratory and injunctive relief. Therefore Hoffman should not, the court held, be extended to disallow the compensatory and punitive damages at issue in this case.

The court also distinguished this case from Hoffman, in which the Supreme Court focused on the worker's wrongdoing because there was no evidence that the employer knew he was undocumented. The court acknowledged that awarding back pay to an undocumented worker hired by an unknowing employer conflicts with immigration policy. However, it also cited the dissenting opinion in Hoffman, which cautioned that "were the [NLRB] forbidden to assess back pay against a knowing employer . . . this perverse economic incentive, which runs directly counter to the immigration statute's basic objective, would be obvious and serious." In the present case, the plaintiff alleged that the defendants not only knowingly hired him but actively recruited him in India, promising him a place to live, an education, and an opportunity to join the defendants' business. Instead, the defendants allegedly put him to work and refused to pay any wages for about three years.

Accordingly, the court held that allowing the plaintiff to proceed with his FLSA retaliation claim properly balances the policies enunciated in both federal labor and immigration laws, because to prohibit the plaintiff from pursuing such a claim would provide employers with an economic incentive to seek out and hire undocumented workers. The court noted that while employers who take advantage of these incentives run the risk of being sanctioned by the INS—a risk they might consider worth taking—"it is the employees who face the most significant and immediate immigration sanctions."

The plaintiff is represented by the National Immigration Law Center, together with the Legal Aid Society-Employment Law Center of San Francisco, and the law firm of Brobeck, Phleger & Harrison LLP.

Singh v. Jutla, et al., 214 F. Supp. 2d 1056 (N.D. Cal. 2002).