DANVERS — The new Steve & Barry's clothing store at the Liberty Tree Mall has found itself bitten in a child labor law sweep.
Attorney General Martha Coakley's office has cited the exclusive seller of T-shirts and jeans of Sarah Jessica Parker's "Bitten" clothing line for employing minors without work permits this summer.
Coakley's office conducted a sweep of 109 Massachusetts mall retailers on Aug. 5, and investigators uncovered 106 violations at 27 stores in various malls. Nearly all the violations were for employing minors without work permits.
Footlocker, also at the Liberty Tree Mall on Independence Way, was cited for one count of employing a minor without a work permit, and it received a $50 penalty.
The Steve & Barry's store, which opened in mid-June, was cited for 12 counts and a total of $600 in penalties.
"They have 21 days to pay and 15 days to appeal," said Harry Pierre, deputy press secretary for the attorney general, about all the cited stores' options. "They still have a decision on which way to go."
Stores such as the Kmart in the Assembly Square Mall in Somerville, a CVS/pharmacy and a Hollister Co. store, both in the Burlington Mall, were among those in the area cited, according to a list provided by the attorney general.
The state's child labor laws, among other things, require minors ages 14 to 17 to obtain work permits from their school superintendents or their designee and requires those permits be kept by the employer until the minor leaves the job.
At 12, the Steve & Barry's store had the second highest number of counts among those individual stores cited.
However, it did not come close to a Hollister store in the Solomon Pond Mall in Marlborough, which the attorney general cited for 34 instances of putting a minor on the job without a work permit.
The store at the Liberty Tree Mall got some good news earlier this summer when company officials said it would remain open after the company was purchased out of bankruptcy by two investment firms. More than 100 other stores nationwide were not so lucky.
A spokeswoman for Steve & Barry's was contacted yesterday but did not have any information about the violations.
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