The Union Label - June 17th
Posted on June 17, 2006 at 1:27 pm by Chuck Muth
THIS JUST IN…
News Flash: The nation’s worst air disaster occurred today when a small two-seater Cessna 150 plane piloted by two union officials crashed into a cemetery located near the union’s headquarters in Washington, DC this morning. Union search-and-rescue workers have recovered 300 bodies so far and expect the number to climb as digging continues into the evening. The pilot and copilot survived and are helping in the recovery efforts.
FLUSHING $20K DOWN THE DRAIN
“The Sacramento Bee reported on June 3 that, angry with his ‘no’ vote against a measure the union supported, the Service Employees International Union-United Healthcare Workers West spent $20,000 of members’ forced dues money on mailings slamming Sacramento City Councilman Steve Cohn just before his primary — even though Cohn ran unopposed.”
- Center for Union Facts, 6/14/06
IT’S ALL FOR THE CHILDREN THOUGH, RIGHT?
“For every dollar [the San Francisco school district] currently spends on day-to-day operating expenses, 47 cents go to teacher and administrator salaries, 21 cents go to employee benefits and 11 cents go to pay non-teaching employees. Twenty cents pay for a variety of other expenses, such as utilities and professional training. Just one penny goes to books and supplies …
“The teachers contract, which included an 8.5 percent raise for union members, will cost the district an additional $19.8 million over the next two years. District officials expect to have to reduce spending in almost every budget category to pay the raises and balance a new budget this month.”
- San Francisco Chronicle, 6/1/06
A REAL RACKET
“Reformers at Teamsters Local 82 fumed yesterday over ex-con Jackie Bulger getting a plum job working at the city’s convention centers while longtime union members go without work. Joe Wright, a Teamster who’s challenging the union’s leadership in elections later this year, said the hiring of Bulger - the younger brother of ex-Senate President William Bulger and fugitive mobster James ‘Whitey’ Bulger - merely highlights a hiring system that favors pals of the head of Local 82, John Perry. Wright and others said Perry hires people based on whether they’re loyal to Perry - and not based on seniority, as Teamsters contracts spell out. ‘It’s a racket,’ said David Levin, an organizer with Teamsters For A Democratic Union…”
- Boston Herald, 6/15/06
UNION BOSS’S DIRTY LAUNDRY
“The Associated Press reported June 6 that a judge sentenced Teamsters Local 5 president Keith Partin to two years of probation and a $3,000 fine for blackmailing a company involved in a labor dispute. Partin, whose total compensation in 2005 was $82,223, will continue to work for the Teamsters while serving his sentence. His Partin shot: ‘I guess everybody likes a little dirty laundry, but I got so dirty I had to go buy all new underwear.’”
- Center for Union Facts, 6/14/06
CRUSADE EXPOSES KICKBACK CORRUPTION
“(Former union organizers) Harry Bowers III and David McCormick were beginning to think they would never see the day. But last week that day came when the U.S. Attorney’s Office won an indictment against the former head of Teamsters Local 988, Charles ‘Chuck’ Crawley, on charges he rigged a union election, took a $20,000 kickback and falsely recorded it in union financial records. The indictment and arrest were a culmination of a four-year crusade by Bowers and McCormick to expose alleged corruption at the local.”
- Houston Chronicle, 6/14/06
YOUR UNION DUES AT WORK
* Charles Wiener was supposed to be managing the health fund of Local 16 of the United Service Workers of America. It took several years before people realized that he’d been draining it. Wiener, 69, who had served as president of the Sussex County, N.J.-based local during December 1996-December 1999, pleaded guilty in federal court on Friday, April 21 to conspiring to embezzlement. He and two others had been indicted in February 2005 on charges of stealing $284,000 from the local.
* On April 21, Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge David M. Horwitz sentenced (Martin) Ludlow, a former Los Angeles City Councilman, to three years’ probation for conspiring to illegally divert union funds toward his 2003 election campaign. Ludlow also will have to pay restitution and costs in the amount of $45,000, remain out of all union leadership positions for at least 13 years, and not hold elected public office for four years. . . . He worked with Janett Humphries, then president of Local 99 of the Service Employees International Union, to steer more than $36,000 in union funds to pay six people on the union payroll to work on his Council campaign.
* On March 31, Donald Hutchinson, former financial secretary for Local 763-C of the Chemical Workers, was sentenced in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois to one year of supervision and three years probation for embezzling union funds.
* On April 10, Vince L. Matthews, former business manager and financial secretary for Sheet Metal Workers Local 29, pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court for the District of Kansas to one count of embezzling $93,298.28 in union funds.
* On April 4, Darnell Smith, former bookkeeper for Local 36 of the Service Employees International Union, pleaded guilty in the Philadelphia County Court of Common Pleas to theft by deception. He had embezzled more than $70,000 in union funds.
* On April 14, William Van Sickle, former secretary-treasurer for Local 725 of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, was sentenced in U.S. District Court to six months community confinement and five years probation for embezzling more than $62,000 in union funds.
* On Monday, April 10, three mob-linked drywall contractors and a Genovese crime family soldier admitted in federal court in Manhattan to taking part in a scheme involving a pair of labor unions. Contractors James Delio, his brother Joseph Delio, and Fred Nisall copped mail fraud, embezzlement and extortion pleas, while Genovese crime family soldier Robert Carbone pleaded guilty to extorting officers of Local 530 of the Operative Plasterers and Cement Masons International Association.
* Leslie Patricia Bell found out the price of stealing from a union treasury: 18 months in federal prison, three years probation, and $156,423 in restitution. Bell, 39, had pleaded guilty last May to charges she embezzled funds from Local 1184 of the Laborers International Union of North America, which represents construction, groundskeeping and maintenance workers in Riverside and San Bernardino Counties.
* On March 30, Michael Griffie was charged in Hamilton County (Ohio) Court of Common Pleas with aggravated theft of property or services worth at least $100,000 from Local 212 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers.
- SOURCE: Union Corruption Updates from the National Legal and Policy Center
