LABORERS (LIUNA)
DOJ-LIUNA Meet over Future of Oversite Agreement
The Dep't of Justice and the Laborers' Int'l Union of No. Am. have
been meeting behind closed doors to determine the next
phase of DOJ's five-year quasi-oversight agreement with LIUNA that expires
Jan. 31, 2000. The Feb. 1995 agreement stopped DOJ from filing a racketeering
suit against LIUNA and created LIUNA's
failed "internal reform effort." The initial deal was to end
in 1998, but DOJ and LIUNA have extended it for one-year in 1998 and 1999.
Reportedly, some type of DOJ oversight will continue, but DOJ and LIUNA have declined to give any details. According to the ethically-challenged Robert D. Luskin, LIUNA's "in-house prosecutor," "everybody is feeling comfortable with the atmosphere and direction" of the DOJ-LIUNA meetings. A decision is expected in early Jan.
LIUNA general counsel Michael S. Bearse, said the so-called internal reform effort has "accomplished what we said it would do." According to Bearse, both sides want "reasonable reassurances" that the so-called progress of the reform effort will continue -- it is just a matter of "agreeing on the mechanism." [Engineering News-Rec. 12/20/99]
Prediction: With ex-president Arthur A. Coia ousted and DOJ involved in racketeering suits against LIUNA Local 210 in Buffalo and the Chicago Laborers Dist. Council (which were all prime targets of the 1994 draft-RICO), DOJ may calculate that LIUNA's reform effort is of little use and effectively dispense with this defective oversite agreement.
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