Plumbers and Pipefitters (UA)

The scandal-scarred board of Ullico, Inc., appointed labor-friendly ex-Ill. Gov. James R. Thompson (R) Apr. 29 to "review" the insider trading scheme that allowed some directors of the union-dominated insurance company to make hundreds of thousands in tainted profits. To see just how labor-friendly, visit http://www.ipsn.org/ullico/thompson_ullico.htm, for a picture from when Thompson was governor. It shows Thompson with Robert A. Georgine, now the Ullico president, who helped select Thompson for the lucrative investigatory job and who Thompson is supposed to be investigating. Also pictured is Angelo Fosco. The deceased Fosco was president, as was his father, of the Laborers' Int'l Union of N. Am from 1975-1993. The government's draft 1994 racketeering suit that led to a quasi-government takeover of LIUNA, stated that Fosco "was an associate of the Chicago [La Costa Nostra] family" and accused him of racketeering acts related to extortion of LIUNA members. Also in the picture is deceased plumbers and AFL-CIO boss Edward Brabec.

Jeffrey L. Grayson agreed Apr. 16 to plead guilty to two felony counts in connection with the collapse of his union pension management firm, Capital Consultants LLC of Portland, Or., which will likely result in a prison term. Grayson is cooperating with federal prosecutors in hopes of getting a lighter sentence and has provided new information on Andrew Wiederhorn's role in the firm's downfall. Wiederhorn was the chief executive officer and controlling stockholder of Wilshire Credit Corp., which defaulted on $160 million in loans and contributed to the collapse of Capital Consultants. Total client losses, mostly from union members, are estimated to be $355 million.

The U.S. Atty.'s Office in Portland filed revised charges against Grayson, accusing him of two felonies: one count of mail fraud and one count assisting the filing of a false tax return. The charges, filed as a criminal information, described Wiederhorn's involvement in deals that allegedly compromised Grayson's independence as an investment manager. Wiederhorn has not been charged, but the U.S. Attorney has notified him that he is the subject of an ongoing grand jury investigation.

As reported in the last issue, a federal grand jury in Washington, D.C., is probing stock transactions by directors of a union-dominated insurance firm ULLICO linked to the now bankrupt firm, Global Crossing. The Wall St. Journal reports that internal documents reveal that ULLICO officers and board members cashed in on some 71,000 ULLICO shares between Jan. 2000 and Sept. 2001, possibly at the expense of the very union pension funds to which they owed a fiduciary duty. The profits were potentially huge. For example, Martin J. Maddaloni, president of the United Ass'n of Plumbers & Pipe Fitters, allegedly reaped a $184,000 profit from timely selling of a mere 2,000 shares of his ULLICO stock back to ULLICO in 2000.

U.S. Dist. Judge James Robertson (D.D.C., Clinton) ruled Mar. 6 that a provision of the United Ass'n of Plumbers & Pipe Fitters' constitution calling for expulsion of any member who distributes "letters of falsehood and misrepresentation" violates the Labor-Mgmt. Reporting & Disclosure Act of 1959 (a.k.a., the Landrum-Griffin Act) and must be excised. Robertson granted summary judgment to union members Charles Callihan and Wilmer Thomas, who claimed that Section 199 of the union's constitution violated their free speech rights under LMRDA, 29 U.S.C. § 411(a)(2).

Robertson ordered the union to excise the provision from its constitution and ordered the union to publish the court's ruling within 60 days in the union's membership publication. That notice, the court specified, should be mentioned in the publication's table of contents and printed in a type size no smaller than 22 point bold for the heading and 11 point for the body of the court order. Robertson also has scheduled a status conference for Apr. 2.