More than three years ago we wrote about a heated protest outside the former Amato Pizza location near Queen and Bathurst. The comment thread quickly deteriorated into name calling, he said/she said and more insults then we care to remember. After 69 comments we were forced to remove the most racist/sexist/otherwise over-the-line offensive of the bunch and shut the comment thread down.

The protest, as many might recall, was triggered by former employees of that Amato location claiming ill-treatment by management and that they had not been paid for their work. Well, yesterday, after the case had finally gone to trial, courts sided with the plaintiffs and fined the local pizza chain $300,000 (one of the largest fines ever for unpaid wages) for failing to pay six former employees.

What remains to be seen now is how Amato will respond and whether it will be able to survive. There's definitely something a bit strange going on with the company. Their original web site hasn't been updated forever and still lists locations that cease to exist; and doesn't include new ones such as the location that's been open for more than a year in Leslieville.

Then, there's a .ca version of the web site that just lists one location - at 429 Yonge St.

What is known is that the company is now split into at least two entities as detailed by this court bulletin. Each were fined $120,000 as part of this court order. The remaining $60,000 was comprised of fines levied on the directors individually as well as a 25-per-cent victim fine surcharge, as required by the Provincial Offenses Act.