SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — Federal labor officials have fined a Utah electrical contractor $376,300, saying the company illegally used child workers on construction sites in Utah and Oklahoma.
The U.S. Department of Labor said Friday that Hildale-based Reliance Electric Inc. used five workers under age 14, including a 13-year-old who operated a forklift, in the city on the Utah-Arizona border.
Hildale, Utah and its sister town of Colorado City, Arizona, are home to the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, a polygamous sect.
The Labor Department didn't say whether the children were members of the sect.
Officials say Reliance Electric also employed three child workers at a site in Bixby, Oklahoma.
The Labor Department says the company did not pay the children and underpaid 56 other employees.
Reliance Electric did not immediately return a message seeking comment Friday.