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Attorney representing over 100 former Bitwise employees prepares to file lawsuit next week


Attorney representing over 100 former Bitwise employees, filing lawsuit new week. (PHOTO: KMPH FOX26 News Reporter Mayra Franco)
Attorney representing over 100 former Bitwise employees, filing lawsuit new week. (PHOTO: KMPH FOX26 News Reporter Mayra Franco)
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A Fresno attorney is representing countless of former Bitwise employees who are preparing to sue the company after being furloughed Monday.

According to Roger Bonakdar, of The Bonakdar Law Firm, more than 100 employees have contacted him=.

It struck a nerve with me personally and that's why I decided to get involved.

"I've assembled a group of lawyers to help me with it. We are locked and loaded and we're going to do all we can for these people," Bonakdar said.

His law firm is hoping to get justice for all 300 employees affected.

“It's just an absolute disaster for so many people. Everyone keeps saying about 300 employees, the reach is much further than that because you're talking about 300 families, 300 households," he said.

[RELATED] City of Fresno and others offer resources for recently unemployed Bitwise employees

According to Bonakdar, his law firm is filing a lawsuit to the Fresno County Superior Court by next week.

He said he would not be surprised if he has to amend the lawsuit, if new information continues to come to light during the investigation.

Bitwise has claimed that this is a furlough is absolutely smoking mirrors.

"It's like putting the label banana on an apple. It doesn't make it true because you call it that. Nobody furloughs their entire staff out of an entire division in multiple locations. You do that because you're failing, you've collapsed," he said.

He pointed out the company did not follow the state's WARN Act requirements.

When an employer has a staff of 100 employees, it is required to give notice to the state to activate resources to help those laid off.

He said it did not offer those resources to anyone.

“I think Bitwise is silent because they don't have any good answers. They're not going to come out and admit yes, we knew we were worse than the Titanic a couple of months ago, but we decided to not notify anyone. We decided to not care about how this will affect our employees and just run the thing straight into an iceberg," he said.

According to Bonakdar's investigation, Bitwise was seeking out loans with extreme high interest rates.

He said it shows absolute signs of desperation before all of this came to light this month.

[RELATED] Bitwise Industries leaves hundreds of employees without jobs

He learned deposits were not being made into 401k accounts since March for a portion of his clients.

He believes Bitwise had malice intent when they switched to paper checks for the last pay period, knowing they would bounce.

Bonakdar said now former employees are concerned over their health insurance coverage.

"They have children that have significant health needs and now they're going to go to the doctor and be denied treatment because they no longer have insurance and have their paycheck bounce and have no job."

Bonakdar said his law firm has organized a dedicated email for all employees who have yet to reach out.

Those interested can email Bitwise@bonakdarlawfirm.com.


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