The owner of a Mediterranean restaurant in West Hempstead was charged for the second time in less than two years with underpaying his employees and failing to contribute to unemployment insurance. The defendant also allegedly scammed two employees out of $50,000, promising them ownership stakes in the restaurant and subsequently firing them without returning their money.
Mahmut Unver — also known as Max Unver — and Red Lions Food Corp., which operates as Anatolia Mediterranean & Grill, employed an individual between May 15, 2025, and December 31, 2025, as a chef, cleaner, and server and agreed to pay him $1,500 per week for his seven months of work. He was only paid $4,200 by Unver.
Based on the employee’s hours worked, Unver and Red Lions Food Corp. underpaid the employee by approximately $33,200 over a seven-month period.
A second employee who worked for Unver and Red Lions Food Corp. between May 15, 2025, and October 31, 2025, as a server and busser was paid only $913.00, when the alleged agreed-upon wage was $1,000 per week. Employee 2 worked an average of 11 to 12 hours per day, six days per week.
Under the minimum wage law, she should have been paid $25,157.
The total amount of wages underpaid to the defendant’s employees was approximately $58,357.
In another scheme, on about May 27 and 30, 2025, Unver allegedly drew up a handwritten agreement stating that Employee 1 would become a 50% owner of Red Lions Food Corp. for $50,000.
On June 23, 2025, a typed superseding agreement was signed by Employee 1 and 2 and Unver stating that Unver would be a 50% owner and Employees 1 and 2 would each be 25% owners.
The employees paid Unver $50,000 for their ownership interests.
In November and December of 2025, Unver allegedly fired both employees for complaining about not being paid.
Despite requests for the return of their investment money, Unver allegedly never refunded the $50,000 nor recorded the employees’ ownership interests in the company.
In addition to the alleged wage underpayments and scheme to defraud, records obtained from the New York State Department of Labor’s Unemployment Insurance Division show that Red Lions Food Corp. allegedly failed to pay its unemployment insurance contributions between December 1, 2024, and December 31, 2025.
The DOL notified the defendants on November 28, 2025, that the business had allegedly underpaid its Unemployment Insurance contributions by approximately $2,196. That amount remains unpaid.
Unver surrendered to Nassau County District Attorney Detective Investigators on April 8, 2026.
Unver, Red Lions Food Corp., and a third co-defendant, John Yilmaz, were also charged in November 2024 with allegedly underpaying several employees by more than $60,000 from September 2023 to April 2024 and for failing to pay $13,989 in unemployment insurance contributions to New York State.
The 2024 cases against the defendants were indicted in January 2026.
Unver, and Red Lions Food Corp. were arraigned on April 8, 2026, before Judge Michael Alpert on charges of Grand Larceny in the Second Degree (a Class C felony), Scheme to Defraud in the First Degree (a Class E felony), two counts of Failure to Pay Wages When Due Under Labor Law and Willful Failure to Pay Contributions (both unclassified misdemeanors).
“For the second time in as many years, this restaurant owner allegedly determined that New York State wage laws simply did not apply to his business or his employees,” said Nassau County District Attorney Anne Donnelly. “We will vigorously prosecute both wage theft cases and work to make these victims whole.”
The defendants pleaded not guilty and were released on their own recognizance. They are due back in court on April 27, 2026. If convicted, Unver faces up to five to 15 years in prison.