Carpenters union’s tip leads to felony wage-theft charges

September 22, 2025 by

Ramsey County Attorney John Choi announced charges of wage theft, insurance fraud and tax evasion stemming from work on a public housing site in St. Paul. (photo courtesy Vince Muzik, FCF Minnesota)

Ramsey County Attorney John Choi and law-enforcement leaders credited the local Carpenters union with playing a key role in their investigation of wage-theft allegations on a public housing site in St. Paul, which resulted in criminal charges filed Sept. 3.

Choi’s office charged Jose Herrera, Carrie Gutbrod-Herrera and Joseph Herrera, owners of Bayvista Incorporated, with multiple counts of wage theft, insurance fraud and tax evasion stemming from their firm’s work at the McDonough Homes in 2024. All three owners face felony charges.

According to the criminal complaint, Bayvista procured a contract to provide labor for roofing and gutter improvements at the North End apartment complex, owned by the St. Paul Public Housing Agency, but the company cheated its workers out of over $200,000 in combined wages for their work.

Rather than paying prevailing wages of about $68 per hour for roofers and $84 for gutter installation, as required on the publicly funded project, Bayvista allegedly paid workers between $120 to $200 per day in cash.

Multiple workers told St. Paul Police investigators that “they had been instructed to falsely tell anyone who asks that they were, in fact, being paid at prevailing-wage rates,” according to the complaint.

Seven workers agreed to participate in the investigation, but Choi told members of the media during a press conference that he hopes to win full compensation for 24 victims in all, adding that the investigation is ongoing.

“We can’t hold people accountable if someone doesn’t raise their hand,” Choi said. “Somebody has to say, ‘This happened to me.’

“Thankfully we have a lot of advocates. Unions are very laser-focused on making sure that workers’ rights are upheld in this town. They’re helping us make those reports, but we have to corroborate that.”

A tip from the North Central States Regional Council of Carpenters (NCSRCC) sparked the investigation of wage theft on the McDonough Homes project.

The NCSRCC is among several local labor organizations with staff dedicated to monitoring conditions on construction sites across their jurisdictions. Carpenters business representative Woodrow Piner, who attended the press conference, said the council is now tracking about 1,400 projects – active or in the planning stages – in the seven-county metro area.

Piner and other union representatives developed a relationship with several Bayvista workers after an initial visit to McDonough Homes last year. Eventually, he said, workers disclosed that their wages were not meeting the legal standard.

“We knew it was a prevailing wage job, and when you see a group like this, typically they’re not being paid the proper wage,” Piner said, adding that it took time to gain workers’ trust.

“In a world like this, where you could possibly have compromised documentation, you’re terrified to even say what your favorite candy bar is. It takes a lot to develop that relationship.”

Rarely do those conversations at the job site lead to criminal charges, but they often do empower workers with the information they need to protect themselves from wage theft or misclassification, NCSRCC’s Dominic Andrist added.

“Union or nonunion, we’re just trying to uphold the rights of working men and women, to make sure that when they’re out there and it’s 20 below, they’re getting their just due and the pay that they deserve,” he said.

That’s a point St. Paul Police Chief Axel Henry echoed during the press conference.

“I think some people think that those folks are just looking out for their membership,” Henry said of local Building Trades unions. “They are not. They are looking out for what’s fair and what’s right out in their community.”

The investigation ultimately expanded from wage theft to charges of tax evasion and insurance fraud, as a newly formed Labor Advisory Council tapped into the Bayvista owners’ payroll records, tax returns and insurance policies. Spearheaded by Choi’s office, the working group brings together law-enforcement agencies, state regulators and worker-advocacy groups.

Mike Wilde, director of the Fair Contracting Foundation of Minnesota, a prevailing-wage watchdog, credited the Labor Advisory Council with helping Minnesota lead the country in “stamping out corrupt practices in our industry.”

“Our public infrastructure must be built first on integrity,” Wilde added. “It’s expected by taxpayers, the lawful contractors who bid on this work and the construction workers who actually build it for us all.”

Choi urged anyone who believes that they have witnessed or experienced wage theft to call 651-266-3371.

– Michael Moore, UA editor

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Contractor who stiffed Bricklayers loses license, must pay $70,000

March 12, 2025 by

Ramsey County Attorney John Choi (R) held a media briefing with Bricklayers Local 1 President Doug Schroeder (L) and Fair Contracting Foundation Executive Director Mike Wilde.

A local masonry contractor pled guilty last month to felony tax fraud after a joint investigation by the Ramsey County Attorney’s Office and the Minnesota Department of Revenue found that he failed to report $2.5 million in income and did not pay taxes that should have been withheld from his employees’ paychecks.

As part of the plea, Stillwater Masonry owner Todd Konigson received a sentence of three years’ probation. Konigson must pay over $70,000 in restitution to the state and forfeit his state contractor’s license, and he is barred from holding any position of authority in a construction, remodeling or masonry firm in Minnesota.

The charges stemmed from an investigation into Konigson’s books from 2017 to 2022.

County Attorney John Choi said the investigation began after his office received complaints that Konigson had failed to pay workers, sub-contractors and vendors related to work on the historic Masonic Temple in St. Paul.

Previously, Stillwater Masonry entered into an agreement with Bricklayers and Allied Craftworkers Local 1 to become one of the union’s signatory contractors. BAC Local 1 President Doug Schroeder said Konigson signed on to meet the terms of a project labor agreement (PLA) covering a publicly subsidized development in Duluth.

PLAs are pre-hire collective bargaining agreements that establish minimum conditions of employment – like wages and benefit contributions – on a project before contractors begin bidding on the work.

Stillwater Masonry failed to make the agreed-upon contributions to its workers’ health and pension funds on four projects, Schroeder said. The funds have since taken independent civil action to recoup most of what they are owed.

But Konigson’s blatant disregard for his workers was a red flag for investigators, according to Mike Wilde, director of the Fair Contracting Foundation, an independent watchdog in the public construction industry.

“An employer or a contractor, even those bidding on a public contract, if they’re willing to cheat the very people that do the work for them, then they’re certainly OK with cheating their subcontractor, the project owner or the taxpayer at large,” Wilde said during a press conference to announce the plea at the County Attorney’s offices.

Contractors who commit tax fraud aren’t just cheating the system, Choi said. They’re getting a leg up on responsible firms and cheating the public services that rely on tax dollars.

Choi’s office is one of the first in the state to hire a full-time wage-theft investigator, who has been prioritizing payroll fraud, misclassification and similar crimes since 2022.

“If we can develop true partnerships with our labor community, our advocacy community and create the conditions by which people can come forward – and also work out the systems that can investigate and prosecute these crimes – that’s the secret sauce to make (cases) like this happen,” Choi said.

– Michael Moore, Union Advocate editor

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County attorneys take aim at criminal wage theft

April 27, 2022 by

Ramsey County Attorney John Choi’s office recently hired Jacob Shawback (L) to investigate prevailing-wage and wage-theft allegations. Shawback previously worked at the Fair Contracting Foundation of Minnesota, which monitors labor standards on publicly funded construction projects.

Local prosecutors intend to shine a search light on the shadowy corners of the economy where wage theft and labor trafficking have found a home, especially the non-union construction industry.

Ramsey County Attorney John Choi recently hired a full-time investigator to begin delivering wage-theft cases for potential prosecution under the state’s theft-by-swindle statute. Choi, who co-chaired a Labor Advisory Council with Hennepin County Attorney Mike Freeman, said the hiring is a step toward moving more wage-theft cases into the criminal justice system.

The most common types of wage theft occur when employers misclassify workers as independent contractors, fail to pay minimum wage or don’t follow overtime laws. The state’s labor and commerce departments investigate those violations, but the investigations often result in civil penalties – a warning, a fine or being temporarily barred from bidding on public projects.

“In a way, it can all be just looked at as a cost of doing business,” Choi said.

“Both Mike Freeman and I have this really strong belief that some of this conduct should be looked at from a criminal prosecution perspective,” Choi added. “Oftentimes, it’s not until people are subject to potential jail or prison time – or that negative publicity of being prosecuted – that you get people’s attention.”

‘Rampant’ wage theft

The advisory council led by Choi and Freeman pulled together prosecutors, regulators and labor advocates to work collaboratively on best practices for holding wage thieves accountable in the criminal justice system.

Earlier this year, the council approved a report that found “rampant wage theft” in the non-union construction industry in Hennepin and Ramsey counties, noting that it comes at a significant cost to local communities.

The report estimated that 4,872 construction workers in the two counties are victims of payroll fraud, that employers steal over $3 million in wages each year and that wage theft diverts over $11 million from Social Security and Medicare funds.

For unions and labor advocacy groups like CTUL, the report’s findings validated the complaints they have heard from people working in the non-union construction industry, where layers of subcontractors and labor brokers too often conceal illegal dealings.

“Wage theft cannot be tolerated in an industry that is so essential to our city’s infrastructure,” CTUL Co-Director Merle Payne said. “Not only does wage theft hurt workers and their families, it also puts a strain on taxpayers when developers off-load the cost of labor and insurance onto the public.”

Raising the profile

The Labor Advisory Council also worked to create a “handoff process,” so that civil investigators could deliver relevant information to agencies pursuing criminal prosecution without hindering either process. The council also reached out to both county sheriffs to get buy-in from law enforcement.

“We know there’s a lot more we can do in the criminal justice system if we get the right kind of investigation done,” Freeman said.

The Hennepin County Attorney’s Office demonstrated as much with its high-profile prosecution of Ricardo Batres. The notorious wage broker pleaded guilty in November 2019 to felony charges of labor trafficking and insurance fraud, and received a nine-month jail sentence.

But even as they celebrated the Batres case, labor advocates warned that his crimes were just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to wage theft in the Twin Cities. Choi said the Batres case was a turning point in his office’s decision to get proactive about criminal prosecution.

“I just realized, we’re sitting here waiting because we’re usually the recipient of cases,” Choi said. “But sometimes to get something done, you just have to go and do it yourself. So let’s go out and hire somebody to be our investigator.”

Choi’s office gained funding from the county board to replace a retiring, part-time employee who investigated prevailing-wage violations with a new, full-time investigator to help deliver cases related to prevailing wage and wage theft.

The new investigator, Jacob Shawback, previously worked for the Fair Contracting Foundation of Minnesota, which monitors labor standards on public construction projects across the state. “You’ve got to love working on behalf of working people, and Jacob has the background of working with labor unions around this issue,” Choi said.

The county attorney said he hopes the increased public attention on wage theft as a crime will have a deterrent effect and raise awareness among other prosecutors in the state. Choi compared it to his office’s focus on sex trafficking a decade ago, which drew nationwide attention.

“I remember when I first started talking about it, people would ask if it’s really happening here,” Choi said. “A lot of people weren’t aware of it. But we gained a greater awareness, and that greater awareness came, in part, because we started having cases.

“Our labor partners are telling us they know for a fact these violations are happening. It’s not a clerical mistake; people are actually stealing. And I think this is one of those areas that needs improvement to make sure these cases get the attention of the justice system.”

Learn more

Choi and others involved in the Labor Advisory Council’s work will offer a presentation at the May 11 St. Paul Regional Labor Federation (RLF) delegate meeting, beginning at 6 p.m.

“Despite the strongest wage theft protection law in the country, we know workers in Minnesota continue to experience wage theft,” RLF President Kera Peterson said. “I’m glad for the opportunity to serve on the Labor Advisory Council, and I’m thankful that County Attorney Choi and the Ramsey County Attorney’s Office are working to enforce our existing wage theft law.”

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