The US Department of Labor has obtained a federal court order requiring an Illinois home healthcare provider to pay 69 workers $1.1 million in back wages and damages for its failure to pay these workers for all hours worked. On Feb. 7, 2023, US District Court Judge Colin Bruce for the Central District of Illinois in Urbana issued an order finding Lee A. McDevitt — owner and operator of Midwest Home Care in Mattoon — liable for back wages and damages. The court dismissed McDevitt’s claim that they were not subject to the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) because they operated solely within Illinois. The court also found the department could protect the identities of employees who cooperated with the investigator and litigation.
The court’s action follows an investigation by the department’s Wage and Hour Division that found McDevitt paid a daily rate to workers employed as caregivers, the majority of whom worked 24-hour shifts, regardless of the number of hours they worked, resulting in minimum wage and overtime violations. The caregivers provided in-home healthcare and assisted living services to clients across Mattoon, Champaign, and Tuscola. The investigation determined that the employer owed the affected workers $562,389 in back wages and assessed an equal amount of liquidated damages.
The court also ruled McDevitt violated the FLSA’s recordkeeping requirements by failing to track an employee’s hours worked, including sleep time interruptions, accurately. By failing to do so, Midwest Home Care’s sleep credit was invalid. The court also forbid McDevitt from future FLSA’s minimum wage, overtime, and recordkeeping violations. Following the department’s investigation, McDevitt and Home Health Care changed their payroll practices effective Jan. 4, 2021, and began paying workers on an hourly basis and computing overtime for hours over 40 in a workweek.
