California Suit Charges Staffing Firm with Comp Scheme - workforce.com
In the new complaint, filed in Orange County Superior Court, Brown charges that PacifiStaff showed construction companies how to evade workers compensation costs by “exploiting a legal exemption intended to only exempt the owners of small (private companies) from the costs of paying workers compensation coverage for themselves.”
“PacifiStaff developed a sophisticated scheme whereby companies would fire their workers and rehire them in fake corporations with phantom executives,” Brown said in a statement. “These illegal maneuvers enabled construction companies to avoid state laws, which require all employers to provide workers compensation insurance.”
Brown said he is suing PacifiStaff under California’s Unfair Competition law and will attempt to collect $2,500 per infraction for what could potentially be thousands of cases involving individual workers.