Joaquin Noble and
several other former employees of Cha-Cha’s Cocina Mexicana in
commissioner wage claims against the restaurant and its owner, Martha Draper.
The employees then sued, charging that Draper fraudulently induced them to move
from
the restaurant with false promises of job security, but then terminated them
after a few short months and never compensated them. The employer argued the
case should be dismissed because the labor commissioner had already resolved
the wage claims, which involved the same facts as the lawsuit. But a California
appeals court has ruled that the lawsuit can go forward.1 That’s because the
Labor Code doesn’t give the labor commissioner authority to decide tort claims based
on conduct that predated the employment relationship, such as the fraudulent
inducement alleged here.
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