- An autoshop owner has been ordered to pay almost $40,000 in back wages and damages.
- Miles Walker previously dumped 91,000 pennies on a former employee's driveway.
An auto-repair shop owner who dumped about 91,500 pennies on an ex-employee's driveway was ordered by a federal judge to pay almost $40,000 to workers.
Miles Walker, the owner of A OK Autoworks in Peachtree City, Georgia, must pay $19,967 in back wages and a further $19,967 in damages.
He was sued by the US government for repeatedly failing to pay wages and illegal retaliation against an ex-worker, according to the lawsuit viewed by Insider.
Andreas Flaten, a former employee of A OK, filed a complaint with the Department of Labor in January 2021 after Walker didn't send his final paycheck of $915, Insider previously reported.
When Walker was contacted by the department, he said he wouldn't pay Flaten a penny. He then dumped about 91,500 oily pennies on Flaten's driveway in Fayetteville, Georgia.
Walker left a copy of Flaten's paycheck and an expletive written on top of the pile of pennies.
Walker was ordered not to "threaten or intimidate," or "retaliate or discriminate," against current or former employees of A OK through verbal or physical means.
He was also told to remove any images or references of Flaten from A OK's website and banned from posting further references to him online.
Walker had dedicated a page on his company's website about the penny stunt after the incident went viral to push back against the coverage of the events, as well as insult Flaten who isn't named but referred to as a "subpar ex-employee." The page is no longer available on the company's website.
Flaten told Insider at the time that he wasn't bothered by Walker's insults, saying that "you just got to kind of ignore it," the way one would deal with an "angry toddler."
"The court has sent a clear message to employers such as Miles Walker who subject employees to unfair wage practices and outright intimidation and retaliation," said Department of Labor regional solicitor Tremelle Howard in Atlanta, in a media statement on June 13.
A OK Autoworks did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Insider, made outside normal working hours.