Midtown Hotel Construction Workers Get $50K Of Stiffed Wages: DA

MIDTOWN, NY — Seven construction workers stiffed out of pay for a job at the posh Virgin Hotel in Midtown got made whole, prosecutors said.

The workers received checks totaling $50,000 Wednesday in what Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg called the first repayment from his new stolen wage fund.

"When Manhattan workers are taken advantage of by unscrupulous employers, we are fiercely committed to making them whole," Bragg said in a statement. "I hope the return of these wages provides some closure to these hard-working individuals."

More than $203 million has been stolen from New York workers between 2017 and 2021, ProPublica and Documented reported.

The now-repaid construction workers had been working for Ampak Electrical Services, which did electrical work in 2021 as billionaire Richard Branson's hotel went up at West 30th Street and Broadway, prosecutors said.

But Ampak stiffed the workers, who reported their missing paychecks, authorities said. The company's management eventually pleaded guilty to fraud in September 2021 and was required to pay $112,000 to 18 workers, prosecutors said.

The seven workers came forward after that restitution was paid and Ampak folded, prosecutors said.

Bragg also announced Thursday that a wage theft indictment was leveled against Samy Garcia Caba, 30, and his company All Luxury Contracting Corp.

Caba stiffed workers out of pay for construction workers on an East 123rd Street project and a painting job in Bed-Stuy, authorities said.

When a worker told Caba he would report an incident in which Caba locked him inside an apartment, the owner responded by text, "GO AHEAD. I HAVE BETTER LAWYERS THAN YOU," prosecutors said.