A LABOR contractor in Shenzhen has been sentenced to eight months in prison and fined 3,000 yuan (US$435) by Nanshan District People’s Court for defaulting on workers’ wages totaling over 880,000 yuan, the Shenzhen Evening News reported Tuesday.

    The defendant, surnamed Yang, signed a labor subcontracting contract with a construction labor subcontracting company in July 2014. He was designated as the labor contractor of a construction project in Shenzhen Bay Technology and Ecology Park, and the company agreed to pay Yang and his construction team a monthly wage of 2,000 yuan per person.

    After both sides reached an agreement, Yang hired over 100 workers to work on the site, and he was paid a total of 2.11 million yuan by the company over three separate payments.

    After receiving the first sum of money, Yang paid the workers’ wages in accordance with the company’s requirements, but he soon withdrew a large proportion of the money using the excuse of buying building materials, leaving only a small amount of money for the workers. The other two payments were also diverted.

    The overall total that Yang failed to pay the workers amounted to 881,919 yuan. Although the labor inspection team in Nanshan District repeatedly ordered Yang to pay the workers’ wages, Yang ignored the orders and later left Shenzhen and changed his contact information. Yang was detained by the police in April in his hometown in Sichuan Province. (Zhang Yang, Liu Shiyang)