FOOD & COMMERCIAL WORKERS (UFCW)
California VP Accused of $277,300 Embezzlement
A federal grand jury recently charged Alan L. Axt, ex-vice president
of the United Food & Commercial Workers Local 1288 Federal Credit Union
with embezzling an estimated $277,335. Before U.S. Magis. Judge Sandra
M. Snyder, Axt pled not guilty July 9 to embezzling funds from the Fresno,
Cal., credit union. The one-count indictment alleges that Axt embezzled
the funds from Mar. 1999 to Nov. 2000. He faces a maximum of 30 years in
prison and a $1 million fine. After the June indictment, Axt's attorney,
David Gottlieb, said that he was cooperating with the FBI, the U.S. Atty.'s
Office, and the credit union and hoped "to get it resolved as quickly as
we can." [Fresno Bee 7/10/01]
LABORERS (LIUNA)
Weak Evidence, Statute of Limitations Help Chicago Boss
In a blow to the U.S. Atty.'s Office in Chicago, U.S.
Dist. Judge Blanche Manning acquitted ex-union boss John
Serpico on four of eleven counts July 9, calling the government's evidence
too weak to go to the jury. The action in effect dismissed racketeering,
conspiracy, bank fraud, and false statement charges against Serpico on
the eve of closing arguments. Jury deliberations began July 12.
Serpico, ex-Laborers' Int'l Union of N. Am. official and ex-Central States Joint Bd. head, still faces prison if he is convicted on the remaining seven counts of mail fraud. He is charged with using his influence to deposit about $20 million in union funds with several small banks in return for receiving $5 million in personal loans he and others received at favorable rates. He is also accused of taking kickbacks in return for a $6.5 million loan for a hotel project.
Manning also acquitted co-defendant, Maria Busillo, on three of six counts but rejected attempts by a third co-defendant, Gilbert Cataldo, to get any of the three mail fraud counts he faces dismissed.
Manning found the evidence insufficient to prove Serpico guilty of bank fraud and making false statements on a loan application. On the bank fraud count, she ruled that the government failed to prove a $100,000 cash payment made by Busillo on a house came from the kickback scheme. The dismissal of the bank fraud count had repercussions on Serpico's racketeering and conspiracy charges. It cut the statute of limitations on the racketeering and conspiracy charges in half, to five years, and none of the charged conduct occurred within that period, forcing Manning to throw out those two counts. [Chi. Trib. 7/10/01]
HOTEL & RESTAURANT EMPLOYEES (HERE)
Boss Accused of Fixing Chicago Election; Quindel Returns
In a series of post-election protests, the Hotel
Employees & Restaurant Employees Int'l Union's Yale-educated top
boss John W. Wilhelm has been accused
of essentially fixing the recent election at HERE Local
1 in Chicago. The protests allege that Wilhelm created rules and directed
resources in an effort to maintain the int'l union control over the scandal-scarred
local. Specifically, Wilhelm allegedly tampered with Local 1's bylaws in
order to permit outsiders to participate in the election, in violation
of HERE's constitution. Also,Wilhelm is accused of inappropriately using
int'l union resources to benefit his favored slate of candidates.
"This was a clear situation in which the general president was engaged in anti-democratic practices to benefit his handpicked candidates," said Patrick Deady, an attorney for one of the two losing slates. Deady said Wilhelm's actions were an attempt to "fix" or "stack" the election.
In the June 27 vote, ex-Wilhelm-appointed trustee, Henry Tamarin, received 1,851 votes for president; reformer Pablo Garcia received 1,140 votes; and ex-Local 1 president and ally of the corrupt Hanley family, Terry Maloney, received 906 votes. Tamarin's "Better Contract Team" won all 18 other posts and 15 convention delegate positions.
Tamarin has been closely allied with the tainted Wilhelm for many years. He led Local 217 in Conn. in the early 1990s after Wilhelm left the local. He then participated in trusteeships in Atlantic City and N.Y. Since 1994, Tamarin has been the president of Local 100 in N.Y. He kept that post even after Wilhelm appointed him Local 1 trustee.
But Deady, who represents Maloney, said Tamarin never should have been a candidate for office. Just days before the election, Deady said, Wilhelm changed the local's bylaws eliminating a provision requiring that candidates for office be members of the local for 24 consecutive months prior to an election. Under HERE's constitution, he said, the previous bylaws should have applied, making Tamarin and two other members of his slate ineligible to stand for Local 1 election. Deady also said it is unclear whether Tamarin even transferred his membership from Local 100 to Local 1, which also could have made him ineligible.
Deady said Wilhelm further sought to improperly influence the results of the election by permitting personnel from the int'l union to assist Tamarin's slate. Deady said at least six int'l union employees were either transferred to Chicago or permitted to take vacation time to come to Chicago during the weeks before the election. Such conduct, Deady said, violates HERE's policies prohibiting int'l representatives from contributing time or money to influence local elections.
Deady said he filed three post-election protests with Barbara Zack Quindel, Local 1's "independent" election supervisor. It's unclear when Quindel might rule. Martin Preib, who ran for vice president with Garcia, said the reform slate filed similar protests with Quindel. Garcia and Maloney agree that Tamarin should not have been permitted to participate in the election. [BNA 7/2, 7/9/01]
This is the same Barbara Zack Quindel who supervised the joke called the 1996 Int'l Bhd. of Teamsters election, in which the campaign of corrupt ex-boss Ron Carey, among other things, looted IBT's treasury to the tune of $885,000 for the benefit of the Carey campaign. Quindel was IBT's court-appointed elections officer but resigned Sept. 30, 1997, after conceding a possible conflict of interest: some of the fundraising scandals that reversed Carey's 1996 victory were connected to a group she and her husband supported financially. In a Sept. 19, 1997, questioning of confessed criminal and ex-Carey campaign consultant Martin Davis, Quindel discovered that Davis attempted to engineer a swap of a IBT contribution to the hard-left "New Party" in exchange for money being contributed to Carey's campaign. Quindel and her husband, Roger, were members of the Milwaukee chapter of the "New Party" at the time.
In the wake of the scandal and her resignation, U.S. House subcommittee members told Quindel at a hearing that she should be embarrassed over the failed election. "I've seen some pretty stupid elections in my life, but to spend $20 million and end up with an election as you did, I just don't understand it," said Rep. Cass Ballenger (R-N.C.). Of the more than $20 million the 1996 IBT election cost taxpayers, $1 million went to Quindel. [Chi. Trib., Newsday 10/16/97; Wash. Times 10/8/97]
Whether or not the the charges against Wilhelm get him into trouble, the real problem here was hiring Quindel. Despite the big black IBT spot on her resume, Wilhelm or someone else at HERE believed she was qualified to supervise an election at arguably the most historically corrupt HERE local in the country. However, in light of the accusations against Wilhelm, it now appears that an individual of Quindel's low caliber is exactly what the doctor, that is the boss, ordered.
International VP Defeated Again in Hawaii
For the second time, Eric Gill was elected July 6 by a narrow margin
to head Hotel Employees & Restaurant Employees
Int'l Union Local 5 in Honolulu, again defeating
incumbent and HERE int'l vice president Tony Rutledge who headed the local
for more than a dozen years. HERE boss John W. Wilhelm placed Local 5 into
trusteeship Feb. 26, 2001, citing a dispute between a Gill and the executive
board that prevented the negotiation of contracts. The trouble arose after
Gill defeated Rutledge by several dozen votes in a Spring 2000 election.
But, Rutledge's slate won a majority of executive board posts. Since the
first election, Gill and the board have been at odds. Wilhelm's move gave
Rutledge a second chance.
This time, Gill was elected fin. secretary-treasurer over Rutledge by a vote of 2,527 to 2,506. But in this new vote, Gill's running mate Orlando Soriano was elected president, the local's number two job. He defeated Arlene Ilae 2,815 to 2,287. Also, Gill's slate won 12 of 15 board seats. [BNA 7/10/01]
ELECTIONS & POLITICS /
AFL-CIO
AFL-CIO, DNC Loose FEC Case
Reversing an earlier move, the Federal Election Comm'n voted to place
back on the public record thousands of pages of
documents regarding an FEC probe of AFL-CIO dealings with the Democratic
Party. FEC voted unanimously to reject requests from the labor
federation and the Democratic Nat'l Committee to keep the documents confidential,
according to a July 10 letter to DNC gen. counsel Joseph Sandler. In its
initial response to the AFL-CIO and DNC requests, FEC in May had made an
unprecedented decision to remove the case file from the public record.
The letter said the file on the case (MUR 4291) would be made public again
July 17. That gives AFL-CIO and DNC time to challenge the decision in court.
FEC acting gen. counsel Lois Lerner's 20-page memo recommended that the documents be returned to the public record. It said: "There is nothing particularly secret about the fact that the Democratic Party engages in a coordinated grassroots campaign with its candidates and supporters during federal election years and there does not appear to be anything in those documents that would reveal any special techniques or demographic information that is not publicly available." FEC's vote to accept the recommendations and put the file back on the record was 4-0. Voting were Democratic commissioners Danny McDonald and Scott Thomas, along with Republicans David Mason and Bradley Smith. Recused were Democrat Karl Sandstrom and Republican Darryl Wold. [BNA 7/12/01]
The Nat'l Legal & Pol'y Ctr. filed two Freedom of Info. Act requests (1) (2) July 3 to open not only the suppressed records but also the documents from AFL-CIO and DNC to FEC that successfully suppressed the records for a time.
QUOTABLE QUOTES
"[S]ome corrupt unions and union officials are expanding their criminal
activities beyond what historically has been recognized as labor racketeering.
Individuals are using unions to carry out traditional vice schemes such
as drug dealing and theft."
-Office of the Inspector Gen., Dep't of Labor, Semiannual Report to Congress, 10/1/00-3/31/01, at 8-9.
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ADDITIONAL BRIEFS NOT INCLUDED ON THE FAX EDITION OF THIS UNION CORRUPTION UPDATE:
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SERVICE EMPLOYEES (SEIU)
New York Boss Sentenced for Trespassing
Dennis Rivera, boss of Serv. Employees Int'l
Union Local 1199 in N.Y.C., was hauled off to jail July 6 after U.S. Dist.
Judge Hector Lafitte sentenced him to 30 days for trespassing in order
to protest Navy bombing on the Puerto Rican island of Vieques. Rivera
was reluctantly prepared for jail time, said his spokesman Ken Sunshine.
His conduct appears even more irresponsible given the fact that he is currently
leading contract negotiations with the Greater N.Y. Hosp. Ass'n for his
local. "Dennis is a warrior for the cause, but he doesn't relish going
to jail," said Sunshine. [Daily News (N.Y.) 7/7/01]
This is the same union boss who last year gave a check believed to be the largest single campaign contribution in post-Watergate federal politics to House Minority Leader Dick Gephardt (D-Mo.) and top Democratic fundraiser David Jones. The two accepted a $1 million soft money check made out to the Democratic Cong. Campaign Committee. Local 1199 also is the same local that led a lobbying effort that spent $15 million in 1999 to have N.Y. State drastically alter its state health program.
FIRE FIGHTERS (IAFF)
Laptop Taken from Home of Pittsburgh Boss
The president of the Pittsburgh firefighters union home was reportedly
burglarized July 5. Joe King, president of Local 1 of the Int'l Ass'n of
Fire Fighters, said a laptop computer worth about $2,700 was taken from
his home sometime between 7:30 a.m. and 1:30 p.m. No further information
was reported.
Recently, the Pittsburgh Fraternal Order of Police has said it will
file suit this month in order to win Pittsburgh police the right to live
outside the city. Who is the only Pittsburgh public sector union official
on record in favor of keeping Pittsburgh's residency requirement for public
servants? Joe King. [Pitt. Post-Gazette 7/6, 7/8/01]
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