When the investigators came, operators of a Southern California poultry processor allegedly hid child workers in bathrooms and closets and hurried them out the back door, according to a U.S. Department of Labor lawsuit.

In two poultry plants in La Puente and City of Industry owned by Tony Bran, federal authorities alleged, kids as young as 14 were illegally working dangerous jobs, deboning chicken and operating heavy machinery. Eventually, the chicken ended up at major supermarkets and distributors like Ralphs, Aldi, Grocery Outlet and Sysco, officials said.

The workers came primarily from Indigenous communities in Guatemala and spoke Q’eqchi’, K’iche’ and Mam. Instead of going to school, the child laborers worked so many hours they were owed overtime pay. Children worked long hours alongside adults, and Bran was allegedly cheating them all out of wages, the federal lawsuit said.

After the investigators left Bran’s Los Angeles-area plants, the workers told authorities, he corralled them.

“[He] told us that he doesn’t care about us, we mean nothing to him and that we should leave if we do not like how he is paying us or treating us,” one worker said in a translated court filing related to the Department of Labor lawsuit...

Bran did not respond to an interview request or detailed questions about either case...

The Department of Labor said that Bran set up “front companies” — Meza Poultry, Valtierra Poultry, Sullon Poultry and Nollus’s Poultry — to employ workers. As part of a consent judgment, Bran and his company, the Exclusive Poultry, admitted they employed all of the workers at the poultry plants. Meza, Valtierra, Sullon, Nollus and their listed owners admitted to violations of labor law in separate judgments, but Bran has not acknowledged any such violations...

“Child labor is going to be the attention-grabbing issue, but the truth is that wage theft, retaliation and all kinds of labor abuses are prevalent in the entire immigrant population,” said Yunuen Trujillo, worker rights and labor legal services managing attorney at the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights...

Several of the companies identified by the Department of Labor as having received poultry products originating from Bran’s facilities have since tried to distance themselves from the case...

But Labor investigators found that Grocery Outlet, Aldi and Sysco had all bought poultry from distributors who purchased products from Bran’s companies.

While “it may be correct that they’re not going to the Exclusive and buying this chicken directly,” Parekh said, “they’re kind of fudging it.”...

Ralphs, along with Nestle Purina and Royal Canin U.S.A., which also were identified in the federal probe as purchasers of products originating from the Exclusive Poultry, did not respond to requests for comment. Rancho Foods, which was identified as the largest purchaser, also did not respond...

Last month, one of Bran’s customers, Sterling Pacific Meat Co., sued the Exclusive Poultry for breach of contract, saying it had to “red-tag” 90,000 pounds of “tainted product” it legally couldn’t sell because of the findings of the Labor Department probe.