On February 17, Robert Carr, former financial secretary-treasurer-business manager of United Association of Plumbers and Pipefitters Local 228, along with his wife, Theresa Ann Carr, pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California to embezzling funds from the Yuba City, Calif. union. They agreed to pay a combined $120,000 and asked the court for respective sentences of 30 months and three months. The couple initially had been charged in April 2009 with embezzling more than $45,000 during January 2000-March 2007. Last August they were charged in a superseding indictment with stealing nearly $13,500. The pleas follow a joint probe by the Labor Department's Office of Inspector General and Office of Labor-Management Standards, plus the U.S. Postal Inspection Service.
Peter LoMauro was a person who for a fee could make a contractor's labor problems disappear. Now he himself is likely to disappear for a while. LoMauro, a business agent for United Association of Plumbers and Pipefitters Local 9, 
On January 26, Helen Stupka, former office secretary for the Ohio State Plumbers Association, an affiliate of the United Association of Plumbers and Pipefitters, was sentenced in Franklin County Court of Common Pleas to 11 months of home confinement (suspended) and four years of community control, for embezzling $13,372.91 from the Columbus-based association. She also will have to make full restitution. Stupka had pleaded guilty in December after being charged in July. The actions follow an investigation by the Labor Department's Office of Labor-Management Standards.
New England affiliates of the United Association of Plumbers and Pipefitters looked up to Kenneth Aurecchia as a union man willing to take on any job. They should have looked more closely. On January 24, Aurecchia, who among other things, had been a regional vice president for the international union, 
On August 18, Robert Carr, former financial secretary-treasurer of United Association of Plumbers and Pipefitters Local 228, and his wife, Theresa Ann Carr, were charged in Sacramento federal court in a superseding indictment with three additional counts related to embezzlement of union funds in the amount of $13,497. The pair previously had been charged in April 2009 with embezzling more than $45,000 from the Yuba City, Calif.-based union over more than seven years. Mr. Carr at the time denied all charges. The latest indictment follows a probe by the Labor Department's Office of Labor-Management Standards and Office of Inspector General.
If you were a contractor doing business with United Association of Plumbers and Pipefitters Local 9, there was a good way to avoid financial problems: Write checks to Peter LoMauro and don't ask questions. Now LoMauro is finding himself having to answer a few questions from federal prosecutors. LoMauro, a business agent for the Englishtown, N.J. (Monmouth County) union, 
On July 7, Mechelle Busse, aka Mechelle Singleton, formerly office manager of United Association of Plumbers and Pipe Fitters Local 568, was sentenced in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Mississippi to three years of probation, the first six months to be in home confinement, for embezzling around $110,000 during June 2005-December 2007 from the Gulfport union. She also was ordered to make $51,169.65 in restitution and pay a $100 special assessment. Her restitution would have been higher were it not for the fact that federal prosecutors could not prove she had stolen more. Busse had pleaded guilty in February. The guilty plea and sentencing follow an investigation by the Labor Department's Office of Labor-Management Standards.
