H. Brooks and Co., the 116-year-old fruit and vegetable distributor in New Brighton, fired its staff and ceased operations earlier this summer season, simply weeks after its sister firm — St. Paul-based J&J Distributing — went stomach up.

Now former H. Brooks staff say their employer stole cash from them, together with wages, well being care premiums and contributions to their retirement accounts.

“There’s quite a lot of criminality happening there, for positive. There’s quite a lot of fraud,” Jon Lemley, a former H. Brooks employee, stated. “If I used to be taking any individual’s cash, I might be in jail.”

The fast demise of two of the Twin Cities’ main produce wholesalers by the hands of a brand new proprietor has left a path of frustration amongst suppliers, staff and the businesses’ founding households.

J&J shuttered operations in March, lower than two years after Jason Jaynes, an investor based mostly in Edina, purchased each firms and partly merged them beneath a brand new identify, New Harvest Meals.

Jaynes shifted his sources to H. Brooks in New Brighton, but it surely did not take lengthy for collectors and unpaid payments to seek out him there. Court docket information present a string of extra lawsuits, together with from the workers’ pension fund supervisor and life insurance coverage fund, since then.

Jaynes couldn’t be reached for remark for this story. A Star Tribune reporter was denied entry to H. Brooks’ important workplace. A handwritten request for remark left with the entrance door attendant went unanswered. Nobody answered the door at a house registered in his identify in Plymouth.

Jaynes has did not plead or reply to a number of lawsuits in opposition to him. Attorneys on the Edina agency Hellmuth & Johnson who represented him earlier this yr withdrew their counsel weeks in the past. They declined to remark.

From January to Could, staff say H. Brooks withheld payroll deductions from paychecks however didn’t ship the cash to the suitable establishments — such because the suppliers of medical insurance and retirement accounts, and the processors of kid help.

Many staff did not understand it till it was too late. H. Brooks then laid off everybody in June, in line with court docket paperwork and the workers.

Lemley obtained $20,000 in surprising medical payments for therapy he and one in every of his sons obtained this winter when he believed his household was lined by the H. Brooks medical insurance plan.

When Lemley known as Blue Cross Blue Defend, the insurance coverage firm instructed him that his employer had stopped making funds on the corporate’s coverage in January — leaving the employees uninsured for months with out their information.

Jake Sander’s paychecks from March via Could withheld his little one help funds as normal. However the county legal professional’s workplace later notified him that these funds by no means arrived.

H. Brooks’ staff haven’t but obtained a ultimate paycheck for the final two weeks of Could — simply earlier than administration shut down operations, staff say. Their employer-sponsored retirement accounts are additionally frozen after H. Brooks stopped making scheduled contributions.

A trustee for the Central States, Southeast and Southwest Areas Pension Fund alleged in a June lawsuit that H. Brooks did not pay greater than $300,000 in required month-to-month pension contributions between November 2020 and April 2021.

Two weeks later, a Teamsters life insurance coverage fund sued Jaynes and H. Brooks in federal court docket for failing to make a contribution between January and Could of this yr. The court docket, in early August, dominated Jaynes and the corporate had been in default for failing to answer the summons, as required by regulation.

The questions each employee is asking: The place is Jason Jaynes, and the place is their cash?

Sander stated he sat down with Jaynes earlier this summer season to ask the place his little one help cash had gone. Jaynes instructed Sander that he did not know, however instructed him it is being labored on.

For the previous two months, Sander stated he sends one or two textual content messages every week to Jaynes asking the whereabouts of their paychecks, when their 401(okay) accounts might be unfrozen and the place the cash is for his little one help funds. “I by no means hear a factor again,” he stated.

“It makes you surprise if any taxes had been ever despatched. When tax time comes, are we even going to get a W-2?” Sander stated.

Sander stated he requested Jaynes about taxes and was instructed, “Effectively, it ought to’ve all gone via.”

That does not reassure Sander. “Baby help ought to’ve gone via, too, so the place is all that cash?” he stated.

The employees are in a protracted line of collectors who say Jaynes owes them cash, together with quite a few fruit and vegetable wholesalers throughout the nation.

Lots of the roughly 100 staff who labored for H. Brooks have filed wage theft complaints with the Minnesota Division of Labor and Trade. The company has additionally heard from staff of the previous J&J Distributing.

“Our Labor Requirements unit has no closed circumstances for both of these employers,” Jenny O’Brien, spokeswoman for the company, wrote in an e-mail. “We can’t touch upon open circumstances, or affirm or deny an open case exists.”

The earlier homeowners of each produce firms are additionally in court docket making an attempt to get the companies again. Each households bought Jaynes their firms in July 2019 and have but to be paid the vast majority of the sale value.

The previous homeowners of J&J Distributing, James Hannigan and his kids Kevin Hannigan and Stephanie Melstrom, bought J&J for $9 million. Phillip Brooks, the previous proprietor of H. Brooks, bought his family-run enterprise for $4.9 million, court docket information present.

Lemley nonetheless blames himself for not recognizing the warning indicators earlier.

In January, the corporate ended its relationship with a payroll expertise software that supplied staff entry to their pay information, deductions and withdrawals. Administration instructed staff it was as a result of the app was damaged. The subsequent paycheck got here with no line objects, only a verify for a similar quantity as earlier than.

“When our checks began exhibiting up clean for deductions, I ought to’ve began questioning somewhat bit extra,” Lemley stated. “The cash was there. He deducted it out of our checks and simply saved it.”

Lemley stated he favored working at H. Brooks and the employees genuinely needed it to succeed, however because it shuttered in late Could and these points have surfaced, he discovered a brand new job.

He is now on fee plan for the $20,000 medical tab that ought to’ve been lined by his employer’s medical insurance plan — a plan that he and his colleagues contributed to out of their paychecks. “I am simply making an attempt to remain forward of the payments so it would not harm my credit standing,” Lemley stated.

Sander’s dad and three sisters additionally labored at H. Brooks. They’ve additionally all taken new jobs. Different former staff, who stated they did not need to be recognized, are nonetheless searching for new employment citing low pay in lots of locations.

“This complete factor has been weird,” Lemley stated. “It makes you take a look at your fellow man and understand there are nonetheless individuals on the market that will completely screw you over and screw your loved ones over. It hurts, . It’s a bizarre factor.”