Photo Credit: Kim Kardashian/Instagram
Kim Kardashian’s currently the subject of a lawsuit from a number of her former maintenance and gardening team members for her $60 million Hidden Hills estate over her employment practices. The 7 former members say she paid late, withheld 10% for taxes but never gave it to the government, refused overtime pay and sometimes wouldn’t allow meal breaks. Itemized pay stubs also weren’t given and a 16 year old working for her would often surpass the 48 hour max for an underage worker. And one worker was let go when he asked about pay stubs and meal breaks.
Andrew Ramirez, his brother Christopher Ramirez and son Andrew Ramirez Jr., along with Aron Cabrea, Rene Ernesto Flores, Jesse Fernandez and Robert Araiza are all suing for unpaid wages including unpaid overtime. Representing these men is Frank Kim of law firm Kim Legal who’s also involved in a lawsuit related to Kanye’s Nebuchadnezzar opera.
Attorney Frank Kim said in a statement to the Daily Mail, “Wage theft and other workplace violations are a widespread problem in Los Angeles. My firm is currently investigating other potential violations against these defendants, as well as other powerful families and businesses on behalf of everyday workers.”
A spokesperson for Kim Kardashian told Page Six, “These workers were hired and paid through a third-party vendor hired by Kim to provide ongoing services. Kim is not party to the agreement made between the vendor and their workers, therefore she is not responsible for how the vendor manages their business and the agreements they have made directly with their staff.
Kim has never not paid a vendor for their services and hopes that the issue between these workers and the vendor who hired them can be amicably resolved soon.”
An ode to Kim Kardashian and Kanye West’s bizarre $60M Hidden Hills home https://t.co/69Iw5V39XT pic.twitter.com/oSGxGzw3JU
— New York Post (@nypost) February 20, 2021
A source close to the Keeping Up wit the Kardashian star said “She does not have a history of not paying her bills on time — never has and never will. She takes a lot of pride in paying people on time for their work so this issue has nothing to do with her and these workers are suing the wrong person.
The lawyer for the employees was very careful not to include Kim’s name in his statement,” they continue, “or directly mention any claims against her, because he knows these employees never worked directly for Kim, only through a third-party vendor.”
Now the first thing that comes to mind in this situation is that Kim Kardashian has a house manager who handles these things. No one expects her to be opening gates and paying contractors. If you all remember, in Porsha Williams’ early days on The Real Housewives of Atlanta, she had to stop what she was doing filming to let a cleaning person in from her phone. Yeah, Kim’s not doing that and the chances of her directly being responsible are pretty small. Still, we’re going to be keeping an eye on this to see how this plays out.
