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Feds find Sun erred in posting H-1B visa notices, won't punish company

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) The federal government said Sun Microsystems Inc. made a clerical error in failing to post notices about hiring foreign workers on H-1B visas, but said the company did not break any laws and will not be punished.

The U.S. Department of Labor found that the Santa Clara-based company should have posted the required announcements about hiring the workers through the visa program at its facilities in Sunnyvale and Austin, Texas. But the department said the company's failure to do so was unintentional, and ordered the company to post the notices. The department did not impose and fines or other penalties on Sun.

The Labor Department's finding came as a result of a complaint filed in April by former Sun employee Guy Santiglia, claiming the Unix server giant favored U.S.-based foreign workers over U.S. citizens during an earlier round of layoffs. Santiglia, along with 3,900 others, lost his engineering job last October.

Santiglia and others claimed the company favored H-1B visa workers because they could be paid less.

Sun had denied that citizenship status was a factor in the layoffs, and company spokeswoman Diane Carlini said Sun has complied with the Department of Labor's order.

``The investigation regarding Guy Santiglia's claims has been closed,'' she told the San Francisco Chronicle. ``We are pleased this matter with the DOL has been resolved.''

But Santiglia said he plans to appeal, and he has also filed a complaint with the U.S. Department of Justice.

``I think the posting violation was more widespread than those two locations,'' he said. ``All my complaints were not addressed.''

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