A lawsuit filed against Jevic Transportation charges that the Delanco, N.J.-based company violated federal labor law this week when it abruptly terminated approximately 1,200 employees shortly before it sought bankruptcy protection.


The lawsuit was filed on behalf of former Jevic employees Casimir Czyzewski and Jeffrey Oehlers, who worked at the company's Delanco facility. According to the complaint, the company was required by the federal Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) Act to give at least 60 days advance written notice of the employee terminations and continue paying certain wages, salary, and benefits during the notice period in accordance with federal law.

The former employees are represented by Adam T. Klein, Jack A. Raisner, and Rene S. Roupinian, of Outten & Golden LLP, of New York.

The workers' lawyers will seek to have the lawsuit certified as a class action that includes all persons who were terminated without cause at Jevic Transportation facilities on or about May 19, 2008. The suit seeks WARN Act-required wages, salary, commissions, bonuses, accrued holiday pay, accrued vacation pay, pension and 401(k) contributions, and other benefits that would have been paid or covered during the notice period, and attorneys' fees and litigation-related costs.

The defendants are Jevic Transportation Inc., Jevic Holding Corp., Creek Road Properties LLC, and Sun Capital Partners Inc.

The New Jersey Motor Truck Association has put up a page on it web site to help Jevic employees who are looking for new jobs: www.njmta.org/events.dws