MONTGOMERY, Alabama ¨C On November 22, a team of state and federal labor officials conducted a surprise inspection and noticed a young-looking worker at a warehouse operated here by the logistics unit of Korean automaking giant Hyundai Motor Group.
The inspectors, according to an Alabama Department of Labor field report, had received a complaint from an unspecified tipster about ¡°under-age children working¡± at the facility. During their visit to Hyundai Glovis, the report notes, the boy ¡°was manually restacking large metal castings.¡±
Inspectors approached the boy, named in company paperwork as ¡°Fernando Ramos,¡± and questioned him about his age and schooling. Answering in Spanish, the boy said he was 18 years old and had attended a Montgomery middle school. But the documents in his personnel file, inspectors determined later, identified ¡°Fernando Ramos¡± as a 34-year-old man from Tennessee.
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