What a Decade of Retaliation Actually Costs a Human Being

Fred Pflantzer was a tour guide in New York City. That is not a glamorous job. It is the kind of work you show up to every day with your voice and your knowledge and your ability to hold a crowd’s attention on a moving bus while someone else collects the revenue. He tried to organize his coworkers. He tried to give them a seat at the table. His employer’s response was to remove him from the table entirely.

He was fired in February 2012. The NLRB investigated and confirmed what Pflantzer already knew: he was fired because he was trying to unionize. A full year later, in 2013, the Board issued a decision saying so officially. Then the company was ordered to bring him back. They did. Two weeks later, they fired him again. Read that slowly. They brought him back, waited two weeks, and fired him a second time. That was not an accident. That was a message.

What followed was not justice delivered swiftly. What followed was over a decade of legal proceedings, appeals, motions, and bureaucratic referrals across multiple agencies and courts. While lawyers argued about venue and jurisdiction and the precise geographic meaning of the phrase “inquiry is carried on,” Pflantzer waited. The backpay he was owed, $66,794 plus interest, is not a fortune. It is the wages a working person was denied because they tried to exercise a federally protected right. It represents years of his working life, priced out in dollars by a legal system that took years to reach an answer everyone already knew.

When the judgment finally came down, the companies named in it told the NLRB they were out of business and had no money to pay. There is a specific word for what happens when a judgment debtor claims insolvency after years of litigation: it is called a question worth investigating. The NLRB agreed. They issued subpoenas to the related entities, including Universal Smart Contracts, LLC and City Info Experts, LLC, companies connected to the same principal, to find out whether those entities could be held responsible for a debt the original company was suddenly unable to honor. The response from those companies was to refuse the subpoenas entirely and then spend two more years litigating whether the NLRB even had the right to ask.

The compounding effect of this on a working person is not captured anywhere in the court record. The dollar figure is documented. The emotional and professional cost of being fired for union activity, reinstated, fired again, and then watching the people responsible spend the better part of a decade arguing procedural technicalities, is not. It is the kind of harm that gets called non-compensable, which is a legal way of saying it happened but nobody is going to pay for it.

This is what union retaliation looks like in practice. It does not always look like a dramatic confrontation. Sometimes it looks like a company following every legal instruction to the letter, technically, while making absolutely clear through its actions that organizing will not be tolerated. Two weeks. That is how long Pflantzer’s reinstatement lasted. That detail appears in a single sentence in a 25-page legal opinion. For Pflantzer, it was his life.

What the Court Record Actually Says

These are direct quotes from the Second Circuit’s February 3, 2026 opinion. Nothing is paraphrased. Nothing is invented.

“In February 2012, non-party New York Party Shuttle, LLC (‘NYPS’) terminated Fred Pflantzer, one of the company’s New York City tour guides. Suspecting that Pflantzer had been fired for attempting to unionize, the NLRB’s Manhattan Regional Office opened an investigation, which eventually resulted in administrative enforcement proceedings for violations of the National Labor Relations Act.” Second Circuit Opinion, Case No. 24-149, Background Section

• This confirms the NLRB’s investigation was triggered by a specific suspicion of union retaliation, not a routine audit. The firing of one worker over one organizing attempt launched a legal process that lasted over a decade.
• The framing of “suspecting” is important. The NLRB did not wait for a confession. It investigated based on the circumstances, and that investigation was ultimately validated by the Board’s own adjudicative body.

“The Board ordered NYPS to make Pflantzer whole for any loss of earnings suffered on account of his unlawful discharge and to either reinstate Pflantzer’s employment as a tour guide or, if that position was no longer available, appoint him to a substantially equivalent position. NYPS reinstated Pflantzer in July 2014, but fired him again just two weeks after his return.” Second Circuit Opinion, Case No. 24-149, Background Section

• The company complied with the reinstatement order on paper and violated its spirit within fourteen days. This is documented, admitted behavior: a second retaliatory firing following a federal order.
• This second firing triggered additional litigation and expanded the scope of the NLRB’s enforcement action to include affiliated entities, which is why Universal Smart Contracts and the other appellants are in this case at all.

“The judgment debtors, however, subsequently informed the Contempt Branch that they were no longer doing business and lacked the ability to satisfy the judgment. Thereafter, on September 22, 2022, the Contempt Branch issued an administrative subpoena duces tecum to each Appellant seeking documents that might help determine whether Appellants could be held liable for the judgment on a derivative basis. Appellants failed to comply with those subpoenas.” Second Circuit Opinion, Case No. 24-149, Background Section

• The sequence here is critical. First, the companies owe money. Then, they claim they cannot pay. Then, when asked to provide documents that would verify that claim, they refuse. This is the behavior the court ultimately sanctioned with attorneys’ fees.
• The subpoenas were seeking documents about derivative liability, meaning the NLRB was investigating whether the related entities, companies connected to the same principal, were set up to shield assets from the original judgment.

“Appellants ‘repeatedly attempted to evade service and have had numerous opportunities to comply with the subpoenas.'” District Court finding, quoted in Second Circuit Opinion, Case No. 24-149, Attorneys’ Fees Section

• This is the district court’s direct finding, affirmed by the Second Circuit. The word “repeatedly” indicates this was not a single procedural oversight. The companies actively worked to avoid being served with legal process.
• This finding is what justified the attorneys’ fees award. The court treated the evasion as sanctionable conduct under Federal Rules 37 and 45, not simply as aggressive lawyering.

“Nothing in [their] behavior justifies any kind of deterrent, sanction, or punishment.” Appellants’ own brief, quoted in Second Circuit Opinion, Case No. 24-149

• This is the companies’ own argument to the Second Circuit. The court’s response was direct: it disagreed and affirmed the sanctions. The claim that their behavior warranted no consequence is not supported anywhere in the record.
• This argument was made by Charles Thomas Schmidt, the same individual who is listed as both a respondent-appellant and as the attorney of record for the other respondents. He was representing himself and his own companies simultaneously.

A Decade of Delays: The Financial Timeline

Who Pays When Companies Fight Labor Law for a Decade

Public Health

The public health dimension of this case is economic. Wage theft and suppressed union organizing have documented downstream health effects on workers.

• Workers denied backpay and benefits for extended periods face documented increases in housing instability, deferred medical care, and stress-related illness. Pflantzer’s $66,794 backpay award was tied up in proceedings for years after the Fifth Circuit’s 2021 ruling, meaning those funds were unavailable to him during that entire period.
• The chilling effect of a visible, prolonged retaliation case, where a worker is fired for organizing, reinstated, and fired again within two weeks, discourages other workers in the same industry from attempting to organize. This suppression of collective bargaining rights is linked in labor economics research to lower wages, fewer benefits, and worse working conditions across entire sectors.

Economic Inequality

The cost structure of this case illustrates precisely how corporations, even small ones, can use legal complexity to outrun accountability owed to individual workers.

• The NLRB spent $38,123 in attorneys’ fees and $321.42 in costs just to enforce administrative subpoenas, money that came from a federal agency budget funded by taxpayers, spent because the respondents refused to hand over documents they were legally required to produce.
• The original backpay award of $91,912 was reduced to $66,794 on appeal, meaning the Fifth Circuit’s review effectively saved the companies $25,118. A worker’s legally determined compensation was cut by more than a quarter through the appeals process.
• Charles Thomas Schmidt served simultaneously as both the named individual respondent and as the attorney of record for the corporate respondents. This arrangement allowed one person to direct the legal strategy for all four parties while billing, or not billing, as he chose, an asymmetry of resources unavailable to workers in equivalent disputes.
• The companies claimed insolvency when the judgment came due, then spent additional years litigating subpoena enforcement rather than addressing the underlying debt. The practical effect was to delay payment to Pflantzer indefinitely while the companies continued to exist and operate in some form, since the NLRB was specifically investigating whether they could be held derivatively liable.

What This Corporate Obstruction Was Worth in Dollars

What You Can Do With This Information

The Second Circuit has affirmed every ruling against these companies. The subpoenas must be complied with. The fees are owed. The derivative liability investigation into whether Universal Smart Contracts, Party Shuttle Tours, and City Info Experts can be held responsible for the original judgment against New York Party Shuttle continues.

The Entities and Principal to Watch

• Universal Smart Contracts, LLC: Named respondent. Subject to the enforced subpoenas. Connected to the principal Charles Thomas Schmidt.
• Party Shuttle Tours, LLC: Named respondent. Previously held liable alongside the original employer as a single employer in the 2020 Board decision.
• City Info Experts, LLC: Named respondent. Subject to derivative liability investigation.
• Charles Thomas Schmidt: Named individually as a respondent and served as his own attorney in this appeal. The Schmidt Law Firm, PLLC is listed as counsel of record, based in Houston, TX.

Regulatory Watchlist

• National Labor Relations Board (NLRB): The agency that brought this case and obtained the subpoenas. The derivative liability investigation is ongoing through the NLRB’s Contempt, Compliance, and Special Litigation Branch in Washington, D.C. You can file unfair labor practice charges directly at nlrb.gov.
• U.S. Department of Labor (DOL): Tracks wage theft and worker misclassification. If you are in the tour, hospitality, or gig economy sector and believe you are being retaliated against for organizing, the DOL’s Wage and Hour Division is a parallel avenue for complaints.
• Department of Justice (DOJ): The NLRA’s contempt enforcement provisions ultimately flow through federal courts with DOJ involvement when companies defy court orders. If the subpoena compliance does not result in a satisfactory accounting, contempt proceedings remain available.

What Workers and Organizers Can Do Right Now

• Document everything. Pflantzer’s case succeeded in part because the sequence of events, fired for organizing, reinstated, fired again in two weeks, was documented and provable. If you are facing retaliation, write down dates, times, and what was said, and share copies with someone you trust outside your workplace.
• File an NLRB charge within six months. The NLRA’s statute of limitations for unfair labor practice charges is six months from the date of the violation. Missing that window means losing your claim. Do not wait to see if the situation resolves itself.
• Connect with a union or worker center. Organizations like the Emergency Workplace Organizing Committee (EWOC), a joint project of the United Electrical Workers and the Democratic Socialists of America, provide free organizing support to workers who want to unionize but do not know where to start. Local worker centers in your city are also equipped to help with retaliation cases.
• Support the NLRB’s funding and independence. Cases like this one take over a decade because enforcement is underfunded. Contacting your representatives about NLRB budget cuts and agency independence is not symbolic. It directly affects how quickly cases like Pflantzer’s get resolved.
• Understand the corporate structure around your employer. This case shows how related LLCs can be used to frustrate judgments. If your employer is a subsidiary or affiliate of another entity, that structure matters if retaliation occurs. Knowing who actually owns your workplace is a form of organizing intelligence.