DISTRICT Court for the NMI Chief Judge Ramona V. Manglona has nullified the general release of claims signed by 16 repatriated Imperial Pacific International LLC employees.
The judge on Friday said she was informed by the U.S. Department of Labor and IPI that a general release form was provided to former IPI workers on the morning of their departure to their home country.
Apparently, the judge said, IPI agreed to provide $250 in cash for traveling expenses to the 16 former workers for the purpose of “credit[ing] against other monies IPI owe[s] to these individuals.”
In exchange for the $250, the general release forms were provided to the former workers “purporting to release certain claims,” the judge added.
But she said the “general release does not have the force of law as a release, [and] is deemed null and void except as a receipt.”
In the stipulation signed by USDOL attorney Charles Song and IPI attorney Michael Dotts, it stated that IPI repatriated 29 individuals in the early morning hours of Feb. 8, 2021. Sixteen of these workers are from Turkey.
IPI stated that the 16 employees had little to no cash and were scheduled to lay over in Guam for two nights and were expected to have expenses for meals. They were also expected to have more travel expenses. The leader of the 16 workers told IPI that they would not leave Saipan on the Monday morning flight unless they were given cash to cover these costs.
IPI said it agreed to give $250 in cash to each of the 16 individuals so they would have cash on Guam and during their travel. IPI said its intention was that this cash would be credited against other monies IPI owed to these individuals.
But IPI also asked them to sign a document titled “General Release” purporting to release certain claims in exchange for the payment of $250.
USDOL said the purported release is in violation of the terms of the April 11, 2019 consent judgment prohibiting retaliation, and is an improper retaliatory attempt to have employees waive their rights under the judgment, and the Fair Labor Standards Act.
IPI reiterated that it only sought to document the payments to these individuals of the $250 cash so that these payments could be credited against money that these individuals were owed.
IPI said it did not intend for these individuals to “actually release any claims beyond the application of the $250 cash that they were receiving against what they were owed.”
In her order, Judge Manglona said the general release “shall not act as a bar or used as a bar by defendants or anyone in any manner against any claim except as a receipt for payment of the amount indicated thereon that IPI will seek to apply against any other money that IPI might owe to the recipient of the $250 amount.”
The judge earlier found IPI, IPI Holdings Ltd., and IPI chairwoman Cui Li Jie in contempt of court for violating the previous consent judgment with the U.S. Department of Labor, and for not paying their current employees for over two months.
The judge ordered IPI, IPI Holdings Ltd. and the IPI chairwoman to pay the current employees’ remaining back wages, the balance of the $3.6 million consent judgment, which was $1,182,793, and create an escrow account to cover the payroll of future employees in the amount of $800,000.
On Jan. 28, 2021, the judge said IPI will be placed in receivership and its assets liquidated if no payment for the remaining back wages for current employees and the consent judgment is received by USDOL in the next 30 days.
