U.S. Department of Labor issued the following announcement on Feb. 19.
After an investigation by the U.S. Department of Labor's Wage and Hour Division (WHD), Utopia Fresh South LLC – operating as Taylor & Fulton Packing LLC in Palmetto, Florida – has paid $87,920 in back wages to 109 employees for violating overtime and recordkeeping requirements of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA).
WHD investigators found the employer was ineligible for an agricultural exemption it claimed and, as a result, failed to pay employees overtime for hours they worked beyond 40 in a workweek. Investigators determined that the employer purchased tomatoes from multiple growers not owned by Taylor & Fulton and repacked them. The agricultural exemption from the overtime requirements applies only to employees involved in growing product or processing and packaging products grown only by that company. Once employees were packing goods brought in from other suppliers, the exemption did not apply, and they were due overtime.
Original source can be found here.