A Honolulu company was ordered to pay $1.5 million to 171 security officers after a federal investigation determined the company illegally denied workers overtime pay.

Jessica Looman, acting administrator of the U.S. Department of Labor's Wage and Hour Division, said in a recent release that Alii Security Systems Inc. devised a scheme that denied overtime pay to guards who worked more than 40 hours in a week, cheated guards out of a fair share of work hours and gained an unfair competitive advantage over others in the industry. 

“Employers who attempt to evade their legal responsibility to pay workers all of their rightfully earned wages will face costly consequences,” Looman said in the release. 

The company provided security officers for Hawaii’s National Guard, the state’s Arts Museum, Botanical Gardens, and other public and private facilities, according to the release. 

The company has since been ordered to pay a total of $1,539,773 in back wages and liquidated damages to officers, the release states. Alii also was assessed $60,000 in civil penalties for the charge of reckless disregard of the law.

In fiscal year 2021, the Wage and Hour Division identified more than $6 million in wages owed to individuals working in the guard services industry, the release states.