Contractor Pleads Guilty To Failure To Pay Nearly $100K In Employees' Wages: DA

SUFFOLK COUNTY, NY — Suffolk County District Attorney Raymond Tierney announced that Geraldo DeAlmeida, 57, of New Jersey, and his corporation, R&L Concrete, Inc., pleaded guilty to failing to pay the proper prevailing wage rate and supplemental benefits to its employees, resulting in approximately $99,671 in underpayments.

According to court documents and DeAlmeida's admissions during his guilty plea, between November 25, 2019, and April 10, 2020, DeAlmeida's company was a subcontractor at a public works project in the construction of the administrative building at Longwood Central School District, Tierney said.

The public works contract required DeAlmeida, through R&L Concrete, to properly list and classify his employees on certified payrolls and to pay them the statutory prevailing wage rate and supplemental benefits. Instead, DeAlmeida willfully misclassified his employees on the certified payrolls to classifications that paid a lower wage rate, prosecutors said.

In addition to failing to pay the required prevailing wage rate and benefits, multiple employees who were entitled to a wage rate that varied between $68 and $198 per hour were only paid between $22 and $25 per hour, Tierney said.

The investigation also found that DeAlmeida completely omitted one employee working at the project from the certified payrolls, in violation of the New York State Labor Laws, the D.A.'s office said.

On Monday, R&L Concrete Inc. pleaded guilty to one count of willful failure to pay the prevailing wage and supplement. DeAlmeida also pleaded guilty to willful failure to pay the prevailing wage and supplement. As a condition of the plea, DeAlmeida and the corporation are required to pay $99,671 back to five employees from whom he withheld wages, Tierney said.

“This conviction reaffirms my commitment to protecting workers’ rights by combating wage
theft,” Tierney said. “It speaks to our dedication to the fight against anyone who would fraudulently and illegally fail to pay employees for their honest labor in Suffolk
County.”