A group of Livingston County Emergency Medical Technicians are suing the county, alleging they have been denied lawful overtime compensation.

The five EMTs; Don Carr, Mack Carr, Autumn Millerov, Thomas Johnson and Tracey Camalet, filed a lawsuit last year in U.S. District Court in Detroit against both the county itself and the Livingston County Board of Commissioners. The suit, which seeks class-action status, is seeking an accounting of the number of hours worked by themselves and all “similarly situated EMT employees” and a judgment for “damages for all unpaid wages and overtime compensation” as well as “further relief as this Court deems appropriate.” The plaintiffs contend that under the current scheduling method, they “frequently work in excess of forty hours in a work week” as well as “frequently work additional overtime hours in excess of their regular schedules.”

But they allege that the county uses an “inflated, artificial number of hours instead of using actual hours worked” with the result being that the EMTs are denied overtime compensation of time-and-a-half. They called the alleged violation, “willful, arbitrary, unreasonable, and in bad faith.” Court documents show the county insists it has followed all applicable laws and statutes and that the defendants have, “failed to exhaust their administrative or contractual remedies.”

The discovery process is underway now in the case, in which evidence is being gathered through requests for documents and depositions. A trial date in the case is currently set for December 2nd. When asked for a comment about the lawsuit, the plaintiff’s attorney, Angela Mannarino, said they would prefer not to comment on the case at this time. Livingston County Administrator Ken Hinton told WHMI it would not be appropriate for him to comment on pending litigation. (JK)