TEAMSTERS (IBT)
Finally, Hamilton's Trial, McAuliffe Possible Witness
Finally, after almost 12 months of virtual inactivity, U.S. Atty. Mary
Jo White's criminal probe into the Ron Carey - Int'l Bhd. of Teamsters
money-laundering scandal will begin inching forward next month. The news
comes from a N.Y. Post report that Clinton scandal figure Terry
McAuliffe -- who put down $1.35 million to let the Clintons buy their
dream house in Chappaqua, N.Y. -- could be a witness.
McAuliffe is an unnamed player in the indictment of ousted IBT political director William W. Hamilton, who is set to go on trial Oct. 12 in Manhattan. Hamilton was charged in 1998 with conspiracy, embezzlement of union funds, mail fraud, wire fraud, making false statements to an election officer and perjury before a grand jury. Prosecutors say Hamilton illegally schemed with McAuliffe to swap union money for Democratic cash. McAuliffe hasn't been charged. His attorney, Richard Ben-Veniste, confirmed that McAuliffe is a possible witness. [N.Y. Post. 9/6/99]
Rep. Peter Hoekstra (R.-Mich.), who has lead the Hill investigation of the Carey-IBT scandal, said Sep. 9: "The entire [IBT] investigation has fallen into a black hole. Nothing has happen. We had meetings with [DOJ] about the [IBT] probe and the involvement of Richard Trumka, the treasurer of the AFL-CIO, Terry McAuliffe and other players. The compelling argument by both Democrats on the committee and [DOJ] was you can't go there because it would jeopardize an ongoing investigation. What we found now is that none of these probes were aggressive in any area whether it be [IBT], campaign fundraising scandals, Waco or China... With the Reno [DOJ] we [should] behave differently in the future... When the good guys are the bad guys it makes it tough to find the truth." [Wall St. J. 9/10/99]
Well said Congressman (esp. the Trumka scandal part). For detail flow chart explaining the Carey-IBT scandal, please visit www. nlpc.org.
Edelstein Again Upholds Carey, Hamilton Expulsions
U.S. Dist. Judge David N. Edelstein affirmed the IBT's Independent
Review Board's decision Aug. 27 that "new evidence" was insufficient to
overturn the expulsion of disgraced ex-IBT boss Ron Carey and ex-political
director William W. Hamilton from IBT for their roles in illicit money-laundering
schemes during the 1996 IBT election. The record before the court-appointed
IRB, with or without the new evidence -- the allegedly perjurious testimony
of Jere Nash, Carey's campaign manager -- supported the IRB's finding that
Carey and Hamilton brought reproach upon IBT and violated its constitution,
Edelstein ruled.
Carey and Hamilton claimed that they were entitled to "extraordinary relief" from Edelstein's Sep. 1998 order affirming the IRB's decision to expel them. Under the Fed. Rules of Civil Procedure, a case can be reopened based on newly discovered evidence or an adverse party's alleged fraud. Carey and Hamilton argued that such new evidence or alleged fraud was found in Nash's Apr. 1999 guilty plea on one count of mail fraud and one count of making false statements. Edelstein affirmed IRB's determination that none of Nash's testimony relied on by Carey and Hamilton constituted perjury. At most, Edelstein said, the testimony undermined Nash's credibility, which doesn't warrant a new trial. Carey plans to appeal. [BNA 9/2/99]
Pennsylvania Teamsters Arrested for Beating Clinton Protesters
Three Teamsters were arrested Sep. 8 for their alleged roles in the
brutal beatings of two Clinton protesters, off-duty Probation Officer Teri
Adams, and her brother Don Adams, during a Clinton fundraising visit
to Philadelphia in Oct. 1998. Warrants for their arrests were issued
Aug. 26, 1999. The Adamses filed private criminal complaints against the
three, Norma Bottomer, Mark Hopkins, and Charlie Davis in May. All belong
to IBT Local 115. According to police, the three are charged with two felony
counts of aggravated assault, reckless endangerment; and one felony count
of riot and conspiracy.
Two other Teamsters, Kevin McNulty and Mark Nardone, pled guilty Jul. 1 to one felony count of riot and conspiracy; and two misdemeanor counts of assault. Their sentencing hearing has been continued three times at Dist. Atty. Lynne Abraham's request and is scheduled for Sep. 24. Pa. Conference of Teamsters boss, John Morris, who appears on video to have signaled the attack by ramming a hat on Mr. Adams' head -- a union tactic known as "marking" -- has yet to be charged by Abraham. "It's scandalous that a union leader like Mr. Morris would seemingly encourage some members, including young adults, to commit violent, criminal acts," said Ms. Adams. "As a Probation Officer and union member myself, I've always encouraged people to abide by the law and to respect others' rights." [Bus. Wire 9/9/99]
LABORERS (LIUNA)
Judge, Not Boss, Names Overseers
U.S. Dist. Judge Robert Gettleman appointed a former prosecutor and
a retired Ill. S. Ct. Justice Aug. 31 to lead the effort to rid the Chicago
Laborers' Dist. Council of the Laborers' Int'l Union of No. Am. of mob
influence. Steven Miller, an 18-year veteran of the U.S. Atty.'s Office
in Chicago, was named monitor -- a quasi-prosecutor who will oversee internal
charges against bosses. Seymour F. Simon, a former jurist on both the Ill.
S. Ct. and the Ill. App. Ct., was named the adjudications officer -- a
quasi-judge who will decide bosses' punishments.
The appointments came three weeks after CLDC agreed to a Consent Decree to settle a controversial racketeering suit filed by the Dep't of Justice and LIUNA. In the suit alleged CLDC is dominated by the Chicago mafia and detailed nearly two dozen mafia members, associates and close relatives who served as bosses of CLDC's $1.5 billion in pension and benefit funds. The monitorship is scheduled to last at least two years.
Reportedly, Gettleman personally pushed for Simon, who is 84 years old and who served on the Chicago City Council and Cook County Board in the 1950s and 1960s. He still practices law with Rudnick & Wolfe. Miller reportedly is an expert in prosecuting long-unsolved homicide cases by uncovering related financial frauds. Miller has been with the Sachnoff & Weaver law firm for five years. [Chi. Trib 9/1/99]
The upshot is this appears to be a refreshing change from LIUNA's failed "internal reform effort" because in the CLDC case, a federal judge, and not the corrupt union president -- Arthur A. Coia, is calling the shots.
DEPARTMENT OF LABOR (DOL) / LABORERS (LIUNA)
Herman Independent Counsel puts Clinton under Oath
Bill Clinton was questioned Sep. 8 by Ralph I. Lancaster, Jr., the
independent counsel investigating Labor Secretary
Alexis M. Herman for possible improper conduct while working at the
White House by playing a role in illegal campaign contributions to the
Dem. Nat. Committee and seeking to benefit a company in which she had a
financial interest. Lancaster interviewed Clinton under oath at the
White House for an hour according the Clinton's attorney Beth Nolan. Herman's
attorney, W. Neil Eggleston of Howrey &
Simon -- who is also the "appellate judge" for LIUNA's
failed "internal reform effort" which oversees Clinton's close personal,
financial and political friend, LIUNA boss Arthur A. Coia -- claimed that
Clinton's interrogation wasn't a surprise. [BNA 9/9/99]
HOTEL & RESTAURANT EMPLOYEES (HERE)
NLPC Questions Bosses' Integrity
Nat. Legal & Policy Ctr., a union corruption watchdog, requested
Aug. 30 that the Pubic Review Board of the Hotel Employees & Restaurant
Employees Int'l Union initiate a probe of the apparent lack of integrity
in HERE President John W. Wilhelm and other officials' implementation of
anti-corruption reforms. "NLPC believes that these possible lapses of integrity
should be investigated by PRB in order to 'insure high moral and ethical
standards in the administration and operational practice of [HERE]' [as
stated in HERE's Constitution.] If PRB finds that such lapses in integrity
occurred or persist, NLPC requests that PRB 'remove, suspend, expel, fine
or forfeit the benefits...of any officer' in accordance with PRB's jurisdiction,"
said NLPC's letter.
NLPC's six-page complaint was addressed to HERE's former court-appointed Monitor Kurt W. Muellenberg, who is also a PRB member. His report last year included reform recommendations. NLPC detailed three concerns: 1) Wilhelm's refusal to close HERE's Midwest Office, 2) Secretary-Treasurer Ted T. Hansen's role in the reform process and 3) Gen. Counsel Robert J. Rotatori's role in the reform process.
"Hansen was listed by Wilhelm as being responsible for a number of reforms. But Hanson is reportedly the son-in-law of corrupt ex-boss Edward Hanley and the brother-in-law of corrupt ex-boss Thomas Hanley. How can an individual with such intimate ties to two corrupt ex-bosses be trusted to implement reforms?" asked NLPC Chairman Ken Boehm. "Further, how can an individual who has had a leadership role within this union for over 25 years be trusted to implement reforms when during those 25 years this union was alleged to be one of the most corrupt unions in America? The common sense answer would appear to be that such an individual should not be trusted to implement reforms."
"HERE has long been a union troubled by corruption... Practices and individuals with links to the 'old guard' should at the very minimum be investigated..." Boehm concluded. To read NLPC's letter, visit www.nlpc.org.
Labor Day, 147 San Francisco Unionists Arrested
San Fran. Police arrested 147 members of HERE Local 2 after demonstrators
blocked downtown traffic in front of the St. Francis Hotel on Labor Day.
Protesters threatened several large hotels saying they were about to "drop
the hammer" unless a contract is signed soon. Arrestees were cited for
obstructing a public roadway and released. The contract expired Aug. 14.
Local 2 boss Michael Casey proclaimed, "This was the biggest arrest action
in the country [on Labor Day], ...we're on a collision course [with management]."
Teresa McKinney, manger of a Victoria's Secret store next to the hotel, said the protest was "kind of scary. It was really loud and nerve-racking. I had to come in a side door, because police weren't letting anyone in the front." She said that it disrupted business and that sales were sluggish for hours after the last union members left. "I really wouldn't want to see a repeat of that." [S.F. Chron. 9/7/99]
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ADDITIONAL BRIEFS NOT INCLUDED ON THE FAX EDITION OF THIS UNION CORRUPTION UPDATE:
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AFL-CIO / AFSCME / SEIU / UNIONS & THE RELIGIOUS
LEFT
Sweeney Breakfast Booklet Spins Union Corruption
AFL-CIO boss John J. Sweeney spent much of the Labor Day weekend with
extreme left religious groups -- the Religious Left -- and kicked off the
celebrating with a Sep. 1 breakfast at a posh Manhattan hotel. Manhattan
has been ground zero for union corruption in 1999. The lowlights being
the 27 union corruption indictments (including 11
guilty pleas) of the Am. Fed. of State, County & Municipal Employees'
Dist. Council 37 and the ousting of corrupt
Service Employees Int'l Union Local 32B-32J boss (and Sweeney's successor)
Gus Bevona. Note that Sweeney himself was caught
double-dipping in 32B-32J's coffers. [Newsday 9/5/99]
In an almost silly attempt to spin or combat this stark union corruption, one Religious Left group, the National Interfaith Committee on Worker Justice, handed out a booklet at the Sweeney breakfast called "Why Unions Matter." The booklet including a section titled "What About Union Corruption?" It read in part: "As wrong as union corruption is, it is unfortunate that union corruption received so much front page media attention, compared to the important justice work done by unions to raise wages, benefits and working conditions for low-wage workers."
ELECTIONS & POLITICS / PAINTERS (IBPAT)
Bradley's 73% Vote Trounces Gore at Union Straw Pole
Former Sen. Bill Bradley (D-N.J.) scored a victory over Vice President
Al Gore (D) in a straw poll of delegates at the Int'l Bhd. of Painters
& Allied Trades. The upstart Bradley won 73% of the votes cast at the
union's annual convention to Gore's measly 22%. [Christian Science Monitor
9/9/99]
GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEES (NAGE) / LABORERS (LIUNA)
Indicted Rhode Island Man Denied Benefits
Cranston, R.I., Mayor John O'Leary has dismissed indicted
city official Raymond DeLuca and is refusing to pay him for nearly
$24,000 worth of unused vacation and sick days that he accrued since his
hiring in 1985. DeLuca, formerly the director of computer services, was
suspended without pay by O'Leary's predecessor, Michael
A. Traficante (who had corruption trouble of his own and is now a LIUNA
boss), upon being charged two years ago with racketeering and bribery.
O'Leary, who took office in January, eliminated DeLuca's position as part
of his restructuring of City Hall. Kathleen DeLuca, who was indicted on
the same charges as her husband, remains suspended without pay from the
position of city treasurer. The couple is awaiting trial.
The DeLucas' attorney, Stephen Famiglietti, responded by requesting that the city pay his client for compensatory time and unused vacation and sick days. O'Leary said the city was required by federal law to pay DeLuca $268 for the 8.5 hours of overtime he had logged. But O'Leary said he would not pay DeLuca $23,995 for 58 unused vacation days and 40 unused sick days. "We believe at this point we can't justify paying the complete severance until he is exonerated. If he is exonerated, we should have to pay," O'Leary said. "We believe a person should have served honorably. The indictment that hangs over him has tainted his service to the city."
DeLuca has filed a grievance over the severance pay with the Nat. Ass'n
of Gov't Employees Local R1-98. His
position, along with others, was actually removed from NAGE as a result
of a dispute with the administration over supervisors being allowed in
the union. But he was represented by the union at the time he accumulated
his vacation and sick days.
In Oct. 1997, the Atty. Gen.'s office accused the DeLucas of accepting kickbacks in return for securing city computer contracts for a company owned by former purchasing agent John A. Calcagni. Calcagni was indicted at the same time as the DeLucas and will stand trial with them. The trial is scheduled to begin next month. Prosecutors say the DeLucas received $188,771 between 1989 and 1992 in exchange for making sure that Calcagni's company, CABUS, was awarded approximately $ 564,000 in equipment and service contracts. The trial was supposed to begin last fall, but was delayed after Kathleen DeLuca suffered serious leg injuries in an automobile accident. Following that, special-prosecutions chief Joseph DeCaporale, the lead prosecutor on the case, lost his job when Sheldon Whitehouse became Atty. Gen. [Providence J.-Bull. 9/1/99]
Note that Whitehouse was the
U.S. Atty. that went after ethically-challenged Robert D. Luskin for improper
acceptance of tainted legal fees from mob money-launder Stephen A. Saccoccia.
In a rare move, Luskin eventually forfeit $245,000 to the federal government.
Luskin also serves as the "in-house prosecutor" for LIUNA's failed "internal
reform effort" which monitors anther corrupt Rhode Islander, LIUNA boss
Arthur A. Coia.
GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEES (AFGE)
Maine Women Sues Union for $2 Million, Alleges Harassment, Threats
A certified nurse's aide in Bangor, Me., who was fired from her job
is suing the Am. Fed. of Gov't Employees and nine former co-workers for
$2 million, saying she was harassed, threatened and eventually terminated
because she reported that she had witnessed a unionized employee beat an
elderly patient. Melissa Ferris seeks monetary damages plus attorney's
fees in a six-count lawsuit that alleges violations of the state Whistleblower
Protection Act, the state Human Rights Act and a federal anti-racketeering
act. The suit was filed Aug. 20 at U.S. Dist. Court.
Ferris alleges she was targeted by members of AFGE, which represented another nurse's aide who allegedly dragged a 95-year-old man out of a chair and slammed him against a wall at the nursing-home ward at a Veterans' Admin. Medical Ctr. called Togus. The man since has died of unrelated complications. The Me. Human Rights Comm'n found grounds to believe that discrimination and retaliation did occur in the matter. Efforts to reach a settlement failed this summer.
Retaliation against Ferris for reporting the abuse was "very troubling, outrageous really," said her attorney, Susan Wallace. They included Ferris being assigned an unfair share of the work and being forced to work overtime when other staff did not show up to relieve her. She also claims she was falsely accused of abusing an elderly patient identified only as "Mr. K." and accused of incompetence on several occasions. In Oct. 1997, a few days after being fired, Ferris received a note at her home that ended with the phrase, "That's what you get for screwing with the union," according to the lawsuit. [Bangor Daily News 8/31/99]
CARPENTERS (UBC)
Illinois Union Not "For the Children"
United Bhd. of Carpenters Local 839 boss, Joe Pompa, has refused to
suspend the local's picketing of the Hyatt Regency in Schaumburg, Ill.,
so a children's charity fundraiser can take place on Sep. 17. Pompa reasoned,
"I can't go out and hold a sign one day and go inside the hotel to attend
an event the next." Members of Local 839 have been demonstrating outside
the hotel since Sep. 1 to protest a contractor's hiring of non-union workers
to renovate a restaurant inside the hotel.
Hyatt general manager Earl Nightingale sent a letter to the union Sep. 3, asking that it not picket Sep. 17 so the Children's Advocacy Center of Northwest Cook County could hold a fundraising dinner that evening. Officials of the Hoffman Estates, Ill.-based advocacy center, which provides counseling to children who have been sexually abused, have said they would cancel the event rather than have their board members and supporters -- many of them union officials --cross a picket line. The cancellation could cost the group $40,000 in donations. [Chi. Trib. 9/5/99]
TEAMSTERS (IBT)
Gotti Gets 6 Years
John A. "Junior" Gotti, son of the nation's most notorious gangster,
was sentenced Sep. 3 to 77 months in prison by U.S. Dist. Judge Barrington
Parker who castigated him for choosing his organized-crime family at the
expense of his own. "I'm a man's man," Gotti told Parker. "I'm here to
accept my medicine."
"You grew up in circumstances where your father was incarcerated, so you knew the kind of toll that takes on family and particularly children," Parker said to Gotti. "The pattern, for reasons I am unable to fathom, is duplicated." Gotti's father, John "Dapper Don" Gotti, was convicted in 1992 of ordering numerous murders as head of what was then the nation's largest mafia clan, the Gambino crime family. Though jailed for life, the elder Gotti has remained a ghostly presence throughout his son's case, which began in Jan. 1998 with the unsealing of four sweeping indictments against the younger Gotti and 39 others.
In Apr. 1999, a day before his criminal trial, reputed Gambino crime family boss, Junior Gotti, pled guilty to involvement in a racket that involved bribery of union boss, extortion, loan-sharking rings, mortgage fraud and tax evasion, and threats of violence. In his plea, he admitted to four acts of racketeering including bribing a union boss, which prosecutors identified as a Teamsters Local 445 offical. Reportedly, the bribe was an attempt to win a construction contract worth up to $10 million for an airport in New Windsor, N.Y.
Gotti is was scheduled to sign a contract of sale Sep. 4 on his $1.8 million Mill Neck, N.Y., mansion and begin moving his family into a more modest home at an unnamed location. His attorney, Sarita Kedia, says he also might buy a new vacation home. He has two months to scrounge up the $243,000 he still owes the federal government, and he still will owe $300,000 restitution for mortgage fraud and $32,000 in back taxes and penalties and a $10,000 fine. He has relied heavily on family friends to subsidize the $757,000 he has paid to date, and if he doesn't come up with money that prosecutors think came from legitimate sources, the prosecutors will begin selling off some of his assets, including rental property in Queens and a vacation plot in Pa. [Daily News 9/4/99]
Final Twist in Kentucky Governor Scandal, Replaces Enemies on Board
Upset with how they enforced the law against him, Ky.
Gov. Paul Patton (D) replaced the two most experienced members of the
Ky. Registry of Election Finance Aug. 30 with one of his leading political
contributors and a law student. ''I feel very, very strongly that this
registry had misadministered this law,'' Patton said. He said it has too
strictly enforced the 1992 law that offers public financing to candidates
for governor who adopt spending limits, as all major candidates have.
Patton filled a Democratic seat on the board with Jack Smith, a former U.S. attorney whose firm's members and spouses have given Patton's political causes more than any other law firm. Smith, his wife and members of his law firm have given Patton's political causes $38,700, the 22nd largest identifiable interest among the governor's contributors. Their giving has grown more than any other major group in the last year and a half. He replaces registry chairman Don Cox of Louisville, a lawyer with broad experience in election and First Amendment law. To a Republican seat, Patton appointed David Samford, a Republican campaign worker and a third-year law student at the Univ. of Ky., who was nominated by the state GOP. He replaces Kent Westberry of Louisville, a former Asst. U.S. Atty. who as the senior Republican member worked closely with Cox in managing the registry. Patton said he did not reappoint Cox and Westberry partly because ''I think the registry messed up the administration of this law horribly.'' Asked how, he said, ''They turned it over to Ben Chandler.''
It was Patton who asked Chandler to investigate Republican Larry Forgy's charge that Democrats ''bought votes all over Kentucky'' in the 1995 election, in which Forgy lost to Patton by 21,560 votes, 2.2 percent of the total. Chandler and the registry later agreed that he would take the lead in the probe, which ended in the indictment of Patton's chief of staff and former campaign manager, Andrew ''Skipper'' Martin; labor aide Danny Ross, who worked in a pro-Patton campaign for the Teamsters between stints on the state payroll; and two top Kentucky Teamsters, including Lon Fields Sr., whom Patton appointed to the state racing commission. A circuit judge dismissed the campaign-finance indictment against Martin, Ross, Fields and Robert Winstead, but Chandler is appealing the ruling. [Courier-J. 8/31/99]
UPS Employee Files Civil Conspiracy Lawsuit After Stabbing by Teamsters
Assailants in Florida
Nat. Right to Work attorneys filed suit Sep. 1 against the Int'l Bhd.
of Teamsters Local 769 in Miami, and ten union bosses and assailants for
their involvement in the bloody assault on Rod Carter during the nationwide
IBT strike against United Parcel Service. The complaint filed today in
Fla. state court charges the defendants with civil conspiracy, assault
and battery, negligence, intentional infliction of emotional distress,
and loss of consortium. The suit also outlines racketeering charges
against Local 769 for engaging in a "pattern of criminal activity" under
the Fla. Criminal Practice Act.
Rod Carter, linebacker for the 1989 University of Miami Hurricanes and former 10th round draft choice of the Dallas Cowboys, continued to work during the nationally ordered Teamsters strike against UPS. When interviewed by a television reporter, Carter explained that he continued to work to support his family. Following his comments on television, Carter and his wife, Earthly, received a threatening phone call which phone records show was placed from the home of Anthony Cannestro, Sr., president of Local 769.
The complaint says that on the following day, a car driven by Marcelo Rodriguez and carrying union militants Orestes Espinosa, Angel Mielgo, Werner Haechler, Benigno Rojas, and Adrian Paez pulled behind Carter's UPS truck. Mielgo jumped from the vehicle, drew Carter from the truck, and began punching, kicking, and beating him. Espinosa, Paez, and Haechler quickly joined Mielgo in beating Carter. During the scramble, Rojas produced an ice pick and stabbed Carter six times. The union paid to bail out the assailants who, except for Rojas, never served a jail sentence.
"Rod Carter chose to exercise his Right to Work. For that, he became a target for a union campaign of intimidation and brutal violence," said NRTW Foundation Vice-President Stefan Gleason. NRTW Foundation is providing free legal aid to Carter.
The civil charges follow on the heels of criminal proceedings which resulted in the conviction of Rojas for "aggravated assault," Haechler's conviction of "attempted 2nd degree murder," and conviction of Espinoza, Mielgo, Paez, and Rodriguez to "accessory after the fact." However, the complaint filed today extends beyond the individuals involved in the physical beating of Carter itself. The charges also implicate Cannestro, Sr. and union officers Rolando Pina and Joshua Zivalich on charges of Civil Conspiracy for condoning the attack on Carter.
Sworn statements show that in a meeting held a few days before the beginning of the UPS strike, Cannestro, Pina, and Zivalich organized a meeting of union members. At that meeting, the three union officials encouraged, authorized, and sanctioned the workers to engage in "ambulatory pickets," which entail Teamsters militants stalking non-striking workers on their delivery routes for the purpose of harassing, intimidating, and interfering with their ability to do their jobs. Later in the meeting, union officials informed union activists that the union would provide bail bonds and legal representation should they be arrested by police. [See <http://www.nrtw.org/b/nr_161.htm>]
UNION DUES / ELECTRONIC WORKERS (IUE) / TEAMSTERS (IBT)
NLRB Finally Issues Long Awaited Dues Decisions
The Nat. Labor Relations Board Sep. 1 decided two long-pending cases
regarding nonmember obligations under union security clauses and reached
mixed results for two unions defending their procedures. The Nat.
Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, which represents the objecting
employees in the two cases, filed petitions earlier this year asking the
U.S. Court of Appeals for the Dist. of Columbia Circuit to compel NLRB
to issue decisions in the cases. Agency administrative law judges issued
rulings in the two cases in Sep. 1992, and appeals have been pending with
the board for almost seven years. The D.C. Circuit ordered the board to
explain why it had not acted, and NLRB promised the court it would rule
by Sep. 1. NRTW obtained information in fall 1998 that 13 of the board's
20 oldest cases involved nonmember-fees issues. According to NRTW, all
but two of those 13 cases have now been decided.
Of the two Sept. 1 decisions, one case involves Robert Mohat, an employee of Polymark Corp. in Cincinnati, Ohio, and a former member of Local 795 of the Int'l Union of Electronic Workers who resigned his union membership, challenged the legality of the union-security clause, and objected to payment of agency fees for nonrepresentational purposes. In the second case, Sherry Lee Pirlott and David Pirlott, employees of Schreiber Foods in Green Bay, Wis., resigned membership in Local 75 of the Int'l Bhd. of Teamsters and objected to paying for any union costs not related to collective bargaining activities.
Mohat, while still an IUE member, requested a rebate of his previously paid dues not spent on representation costs and a statement of the exact percentage of total dues spent on those costs. IUE denied Mohat's request for a refund and asserted that Comm. Workers of Am. v. Beck doesn't apply to union members. The union told Mohat that nonmembers could only request fee reductions during April of each year, pursuant to an established procedure published every March in the union newsletter, which Mohat claimed he had never received. He resigned from the union in Nov. 1990 and expressly objected to payment of any fees used for nonrepresentational purposes. IUE informed Mohat that he had to wait until the following April to raise a Beck objection and that he was still obligated to pay fees equal to the amount of union dues. He also tried to revoke the authorization he had signed for Polymark to deduct dues from his paychecks, but the company said it would continue to withhold the money and place it in an escrow account until the controversy was resolved.
The NLRB general counsel's office issued a complaint alleging that the union-security clause was unlawful on its face because it required that employees "become and remain members in good standing of the Union" and failed to explain their rights. In their Sep. 1 ruling, all five members agreed to dismiss this claim based on the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Marquez v. Screen Actors Guild, that a union does not violate its duty of fair representation by negotiating a union-security clause tracking the language of Section 8(a)(3) of the Nat. Labor Relations Act. The section authorizes unions and employers to negotiate agreements requiring union membership as a condition of employment. The court ruled in Marquez that by tracking Section 8(a)(3), the union-security clause incorporates the case law interpreting that language.
In the second case, the Pirlotts jointly resigned from the Teamsters in Sep. 1989 and stated that they would only pay fees for the union's representational activities. The Teamsters stated that 1.1 percent of its expenditures for the previous year had been for nonrepresentational activities, reduced the Pirlotts' financial obligation accordingly, and provided an itemized schedule of chargeable and nonchargeable expenses. The union explained that nonmembers could file a challenge within 14 days of receipt of the annual disclosure statement, the union's executive board had 14 days to decide the challenge, and a neutral arbitrator could decide an appeal filed within 10 days from the executive board's decision. All five board members again affirmed the ALJ's finding that the union-security clause was not unlawful on its face, based on Marquez.
The ALJ found that the Teamsters did not violate the act by failing to notify newly hired employees of their right to be nonmembers and to object to paying fees for nonrepresentational activities. All five members disagreed, relying on Cal. Saw and Paperworkers Local 1033 which were issued after the ALJ's ruling. Finding that the union's secretary-treasurer admitted that the union never informed new hires of their rights prior to their joining the union, the board decided that the Teamsters acted illegally. [BNA 9/3/99]
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Union Corruption Update is part of NLPC's Organized Labor Accountability Project which is investigating and exposing corruption and extremism in the Teamsters, LIUNA, AFL-CIO and many other union organizations. NLPC is a nonpartisan, nonprofit foundation promoting ethics and accountability in government through research, education and legal action.
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