Four Brothers faces $1 million lawsuit

The Four Brothers Pizza Inn restaurant chain is facing allegations of wage-and-hour violations in a $1 million class-action lawsuit. The nine-restaurant chain has locations in Amenia, Dover, Millerton and Hillsdale in New York and in Great Barrington in Massachusetts.The lawsuit was filed on March 6 by the Worker Justice Center of New York (WJCNY) and co-counsel Charny & Associates, against Four Brothers Pizza Inc., Peter Stefanopoulos, William Stefanopoulos, George Stefanopoulos and Christo Stefanopoulos. The two plaintiffs, who have remained anonymous, claim Four Brothers engaged in wage-and-hour violations, with an estimated $1 million owed to dozens of immigrant workers who were allegedly told to clock out but then remain working without pay.“This case is yet another example of how far employers will go to exploit and humiliate hardworking immigrants on a daily basis who are simply trying to feed their families,” said Milan Bhatt, co-executive director of the Worker Justice Center. “Despite key labor law reforms in recent years aimed at curbing wage theft in New York and efforts by organizations like ours to seek justice for victims of workplace abuse, still more needs to be done to ensure adequate labor standards including a real minimum wage, necessary levels of labor law enforcement and a functional federal immigration system that brings low-wage workers out of the shadows.”Attorney Nathaniel Charny of Charny & Associates charges Four Brothers’ actions allowed the restaurant chain to avoid the legal obligation to pay their workers overtime after reaching the full-time workload maximum of 40 hours per week. Charny also said the workers were allegedly discriminated against, called racial slurs and intimidated. However, those charges are not included in the lawsuit.The lawsuit alleges the plaintiffs and others “regularly worked between 60 and 72 hours per week for [the defendant] but were not compensated at a rate of time-and-one-half their regular hourly rates for hours worked in excess of 40 hours on such occasions.”The suit also claims it was commonplace for employees to work “in excess of 10 hours on a given day,” and that “the plaintiffs and others similarly situated were then paid in cash a weekly salary between $300 and $500.”Due to concerns the workers could face retribution, District Court Justice Judge Edgardo Ramos granted WJCNY’s and Charny & Associates’ application to keep the plaintiffs anonymous, allowing them to be listed as John Doe I and John Doe II.Charny said, “We were able to show that the public interest in enforcing the wage-and-hour laws, combined with the real threat of retaliatory action by the employer, outweighed the presumption that all parties to litigation must be identified.”Bhatt added the workers were fearful that if they came forward to complain about their wages their employer would call immigration to investigate and possibly deport them.“Currently, they have money that should be paid to the workers,” said Charny of the Stefanopouloses. “It is a lot of money that is not theirs to keep. We understand it’s a successful business, but some portion of the success was because they weren’t paying correct wages to the workers. This lawsuit will fix that and make sure [those wages] are paid to the workers.”When contacted, John Stefanopoulos said neither the Four Brothers Pizza chain nor any family members had any comment.