Five former members of Ironworkers Local 401 indicted on
racketeering, arson and related charges in February will face two additional counts
of extortion, federal prosecutors in Philadelphia said Wednesday.
Zane Memeger, U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Pa.,
said the new allegations concern 14 additional acts of extortions, or “night
work,” committed at various construction sites in the Philadelphia area,
including several local schools.
Named in the two new counts are Local 401’s former Business
Manager Joseph Dougherty and former business agents Christopher Prophet,
Richard Ritchie, Edward Sweeney and William O’Donnell. Co-defendant Francis
Sean O’Donnell is also named in the narrative added to the RICO count but was
not charged with the additional extortion counts. They were indicted in
February with co-defendants James Walsh, William Gillin, Daniel Hennigar and
Greg Sullivan.
The indictment says that Ironworkers business agents would
approach non-union contractors performing work at the job sites and demand that
they hire union ironworkers. If the non-union contractors refused, members of
the Ironworkers Local 401, which prosecutors said was sometimes referred to as
the “Shadow Gang,” would allegedly sneak into the construction site at night,
use sledgehammers to smash the anchor bolts of the building, and damage
equipment.
Prosecutors said each incident caused tens of thousands of
dollars in damage and construction delays. The vandalized construction sites
included elementary schools in Wallingford and Sharon Hill, a firehouse in
Eddystone, an assisted living facility in Horsham, as well as sites in
Havertown, Wynnewood, Malvern, and Drexel Hill.
One example cited in the indictment includes significant
damage to a construction site at a commercial business in Malvern. Prosecutors
allege that on January 20, 2012, Francis Sean O’Donnell allegedly reported at a
general meeting of the Ironworkers Local 401, in the presence of Dougherty and
the others who were charged, that he was “in negotiations” with the contractors
to hire union ironworkers and that if the Ironworkers Local 401 does not “get
some men put on they are going to run into some unsuspected delays.”
A month later, prosecutors said O’Donnell allegedly reported
that the contractor failed to hire any union ironworkers and stated “I just
want to thank the Shadow Crew for another job well done. They were shut down
for about a week and cost them about $150,000.” O’Donnell further allegedly
reported at this meeting that “about a week after that I got a call” from the
contractor wanting to hire some union ironworkers.
In February, prosecutors charged the Ironworkers with
setting fire to a Chestnut Hill Quaker meetinghouse in December 2012 after the
contractor there refused to hire union workers. They were also charged with
threatening non-union workers outside a King of Prussia construction site.
The case was investigated jointly by the FBI and Department
of Labor Office of Inspector General, with assistance provided by the
Philadelphia Police Department Corruption Task Force, East Whiteland Township
Police Department, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives,
and the Employee Benefit Security Administration. Assistant U.S. Attorney
Robert Livermore is prosecuting the case along with Gerald Toner, the U.S.
Department of Justice’s acting deputy chief for labor-management racketeering
in its organized crime and gang section.
Source: Philadelphia
Business Journal
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