A friend of mine recently notified me that there was an executive board hearing at his union local; the outcome of the hearing was that a union official had been found to have misappropriated union funds and union property (apparently unauthorized trips in a car owned by the local). He said that the hearing findings and evidence used to determine those findings were to be sent to the Department of Labor.
Dafuq?
Why not to a police agency or a DA as a criminal complaint? Does the Department of Labor have prosecutorial powers and jurisdiction in matters of criminal misconduct by union offficials?
The only thing I can think might explain it is the act that a union local can encompass many cities (multiple police departments) and even several counties (multiple DAs), and the DoL is the only agency that doesn’t need to worry about crossing jurisdictions.
Just a guess here, but perhaps they are looping in the DoL not for prosecution of the official, but more as a “Hey, we discovered some wrongdoing in our office and wanted to come clean to our government overseers”. More a CYA so the government doesn’t feel the need to investigate the union leadership as a whole.
Apparently the Department of Labor’s Inspector General’s Office has the authority to investigate cases when there’s evidence of organized crime involvement in union affairs. From the OP’s description I don’t see how that’s relevant here.
I’m not sure if the OP is referring to the US DOL or a similarly-named state agency- but it is entirely possible that the same behavior can constitute a crime to be investigated and prosecuted by the criminal authorities (police and prosecutor) and also a violation of laws or regulations to be enforced by some other agency.
In addition to the state crime, whatever that state might be, it’s a federal crime for anyone to unlawfully use union assets. 29 USC § 501(c) provides:
Investigations of violations of this section can be handled by the FBI, or by the Office of Labor-Management Standards, Department of Labor. Investigations by OLMS that uncover potential criminal activity are referred to the US Attorney in the jurisdiction, who decides whther to prosecute or refer the matter to state authorities.