Opinion ID: 1192428
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: barth is entitled to treble damages.

Text: Barth asserts that pursuant to I.C. § 45-617(4) he is entitled to treble the amount of additional wages to which he is entitled. We agree. Idaho Code § 45-617(4) states that the plaintiff, or the director [of the department of labor and industrial services] in his behalf, shall be entitled to recover from the defendant, as damages, three (3) times the amount of unpaid wages found due and owing. In 1989, in amending the wage claim law, the legislature added I.C. § 45-611. 1989 Idaho Sess. Laws ch. 280, § 12, 677, 681-82. The first subsection of this new section requires the employer to pay all wages not in dispute, leaving to the employee all remedies to which the employee is otherwise entitled. I.C. § 45-611(1). If the employer pays the nondisputed wages before a certain deadline, then no penalties may be assessed under this chapter, unless it can be shown that the remaining balance of wages due were withheld willfully, arbitrarily and without just cause. Id. The issue we must resolve is whether I.C. § 45-611 applies to I.C. § 45-617(4). When a statute allows an award beyond actual damages, we must decide whether the award is intended to be a penalty or compensation. If it is intended to be a penalty, the statute's requirements must be strictly construed; if it is intended to be compensatory, the statutory requirements are not to be strictly construed. See Halliday v. Farmers Ins. Exch., 89 Idaho 293, 297-301, 404 P.2d 634, 636-38 (1965) (determining whether mandatory attorney fees in I.C. § 41-1839 were penal or compensatory); Tomazich v. Padis, 72 Idaho 77, 82, 237 P.2d 1071, 1074 (1951) (construing treble damages section of Federal Housing and Rent Act to be penal in nature). In the cases where treble damages are a penalty, the Court insists that the plaintiff show that the defendant acted maliciously, wantonly, or oppressively (i.e., in bad faith) before the Court will award treble damages. See, e.g., Mecham v. Nelson, 92 Idaho 783, 789, 451 P.2d 529, 535 (1969) (applying the bad faith rule to unlawful detainer statute's treble damage provision). If the Court determines the statute is not penal, it does not insist on a showing of bad faith. In Goff v. H.J.H. Co., 95 Idaho 837, 521 P.2d 661 (1974), the Court considered whether to award treble damages under the predecessor to I.C. § 45-617(4). In Goff, an employer, relying on the unlawful detainer cases, argued that the wage claim treble damage awards are penal in nature and require a showing of bad faith. Id. at 839, 521 P.2d at 663. The Court rejected the employer's argument, stating: The average wage earner depends greatly on the regular receipt of earned wages. If unpaid, serious economic injury may result to the wage earner. The legislature also has recognized that the wage earner would not be fully compensated if he were allowed merely to recover his withheld wages because of the costs of attorney's fees and suit. Although attorney's fees are authorized by statute, they can not be awarded unless the wage earner recovers all that he claims. Therefore, in many cases there is a need for additional compensation. Thus, although the award of treble damages does tend to penalize the employer, it also serves to fully compensate the wage earning employee for the injury caused him by the delay he experiences in recovering his withheld wages in a court of law and the expenses connected with recovery. Id. at 839-40, 521 P.2d at 663-64 (emphasis added). Contra Gano v. Air Idaho, Inc., 99 Idaho 720, 722, 587 P.2d 1255, 1257 (1978) (calling the treble damages section a penalty and requiring a showing of wrongful withholding). But see Schoonover v. Bonner County, 113 Idaho 916, 922, 750 P.2d 95, 101 (1988) (stating that the rationale for awarding treble damages is to compensate wage earners); Gilbert v. Moore, 108 Idaho 165, 169, 697 P.2d 1179, 1183 (1985) (holding that Goff was not wrongly decided). When the legislature amended the wage claim law (I.C. §§ 45-601 to -617) in 1989, it specifically referred to penalties for failure to pay wages due upon separation from employment (I.C. §§ 45-606 and -607) and allowed the director of the department of labor and industrial services to levy a civil penalty upon any employer who failed to obtain an exemption from the requirement to pay wages within ten days following the end of a pay period. 1989 Idaho Sess. Laws ch. 280, §§ 7-8, 677, 679-81. These references to penalties indicate that the legislature intended the word penalty in I.C. § 45-611 to refer to the penalties provided in these sections of the wage claim law. There is no reference to penalty in the title or in the body of I.C. § 45-617. We find no indication that the legislature intended that a treble damage award pursuant to I.C. § 45-617(4) should be considered a penalty under I.C. § 45-611. We assume that when the legislature made the 1989 amendments to the wage claim law it knew that this Court had construed treble damage awards under the wage claim law as not being penalties. George W. Watkins Family v. Messenger, 118 Idaho 537, 540, 797 P.2d 1385, 1388 (1990) (assuming the legislature has full knowledge of the existing judicial decisions and case law of the state). Therefore, we conclude that the legislature did not intend the word penalty, as used in I.C. § 45-611, to refer to the award of treble damages in I.C. § 45-617(4). Based on this conclusion, Barth is entitled to treble damages.