Laborers Local 1001 Trusteeship Hearing Nov. 11, 2003

John J. Flood Bio & Jim McGough (Biography)
6304 N Francisco Av
Chicago. Il 60659
773-878-1002(tel)

1
2 -----------------------------------X
3 In the Matter of
4 The Trusteeship Proceeding
Of Local Union 1001
5 Chicago, Illinois.
6 Docket Number 03-21T
7 -----------------------------------X
8
Hilton Palmer House
9 17 East Monroe Street
Chicago, Illinois 60603
10
11 November 11, 2003
9:30 AM
12
13
14
15 Before:
16 PETER F. VAIRA, ESQ.
Messrs. Vaira & Riley, P.C.
17 1600 Market Street - 2650
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19103
18
19 INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER.
20
21
22
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24
25

1 APPEARANCES:
2 Messrs. THOMAS & ASSOCIATES
Office of the GEB Attorney
3 LIUNA
Federal Reserve Building
4 600 Atlantic Avenue
12th Floor
5 Boston, Massachusetts 02210-2211
6 By: ROBERT M. THOMAS, JR., Esq., of Counsel
7
Messrs. WINSTON & STRAWN
8 Attorney for Local Union 1001
35 West Wacker Drive
9 Chicago, Illinois 60601-9703
10 BY: MATTHIAS A. LYDON, Esq., of Counsel
SAMUEL MENDENHALL, Esq., of Counsel
11
12 Messrs. FARACI & FARACI
Attorney for Local Union 1001
13 203 North LaSalle Street
Suite 2350
14 Chicago, Illinois 60601
15 BY: PETER S. FARACI, Esq., of Counsel
16
17 PRESENT:
18 KATHLEEN M. NAGLE, Esq., Messrs. Vaira & Riley
19
20
21
22
23
24
25

1 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Ladies and
2 gentlemen, let's go on the record, finally.
3 Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. I'm
4 Peter Vaira, and I'm the Independent Hearing Officer
5 for the Laborers' International Union of North America.
6 This particular proceeding is in regards to a
7 Trusteeship complaint filed against Local 1001,
8 Chicago, Illinois. And the Docket Number is 03-21T, as
9 in Tom.
10 And sitting beside me is my associate,
11 attorney Miss Kathy Nagle.
12 Representing the General Executive Board is
13 Mr. --
14 MR. THOMAS: Robert Thomas.
15 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: I remember
16 your name. I just wanted to hear you say it.
17 MR. THOMAS: Robert M. Thomas, Jr.
18 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: And
19 representing Local 1001? I have an array here.
20 MR. FARACI: Peter Faraci of Faraci & Faraci.
21 MR. MENDENHALL: Samuel Mendenhall of Winston
22 & Strawn.
23 MR. LYDON: And Matt Lydon from Winston &
24 Strawn.
25 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Ladies and

1 gentlemen, I have before me a number of motions, and --
2 given to me by Mr. Mendenhall and Mr. Faraci this
3 morning. And copies have been given to me and Mr.
4 Thomas, and we studied them for about twenty minutes or
5 so, and we'll deal with them -- and I believe Mr. Lydon
6 has something he wants to put on the record.
7 MR. LYDON: Just as an initial matter, Mr.
8 Vaira. As you know, I appeared -- I'm appearing here
9 today on behalf of Local 1001. And I had been
10 scheduled to be elsewhere through Thursday, but I'm
11 here and hopeful that my participation and assistance
12 to Mr. Mendenhall and Mr. Faraci will have some
13 possible consequences.
14 I wanted to acknowledge on the record with
15 respect to the motions that have preceded my appearance
16 here today, that I did speak last week with Robert
17 Luskin and then with Mr. Thomas about accommodating my
18 schedule and the request for a continuance. And Mr.
19 Thomas and I did agree to dates, including a Saturday
20 or two, in order to be done in mid December with
21 testimony.
22 While I was in agreement with the proposal to
23 dismiss the lawsuit for the agreed schedule, my client
24 and co-counsel were more immersed in the issues and
25 nuances of this situation than I am, but did not agree,

1 and hence we're here today.
2 At the same time, I agree with co-counsel
3 that the possibility of simultaneous litigation, which
4 Mr. Luskin abhorred in his letter objecting to a short
5 continuance, could as easily be addressed by an
6 expedited briefing schedule in the Federal Court. And
7 refusing to continue this proceeding yields the result
8 of the situation, seems to me, to which he objected.
9 In that being, I wanted to make this preliminary
10 statement that Local 1001 does not agree that this
11 matter is substantively hearable. Nor do we consent
12 that you have jurisdiction to resolve any questions to
13 substantive hearability. We expressly reserve the
14 right to an independent de novo determination of
15 whether you have jurisdiction to hear the matter in a
16 court competent jurisdiction. And without waiver of
17 this right, we're here and ready to proceed.
18 MR. THOMAS: Excuse me, Mr. Lydon. The
19 return phone call came. May I ask that we take a break
20 in your statement so I can --
21 MR. LYDON: Sure.
22 MR. THOMAS: Thank you.
23 (Whereupon a break was taken in
24 the proceedings after which the
25 following proceedings were had:)

1 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Mr. Lydon
2 was saying that you had some discussion about some
3 scheduling. Go ahead.
4 MR. LYDON: What I was going to say is that
5 while -- I think where I left off with is we're ready
6 to proceed without waiving our jurisdictional claims.
7 I would like some accommodation. I flew back here
8 late Sunday to prepare in this case. I had to
9 yesterday also handle rescheduling of other matters
10 that were to involve me. And I find at least one
11 aspect of this case a rather daunting task, one to
12 which I'm not immediately prepared. And that would be
13 cross examining Mr. O'Rourke, or whoever it is, who is
14 going to speak to the association of organized crime.
15 There is quite a volume of material to review. So what
16 I'm asking for is an opportunity to defer cross
17 examination until I've had an opportunity to do that.
18 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: I'll do
19 that.
20 MR. LYDON: And other than that, at this time
21 I would waive opening. I really may make an opening
22 statement when we get to a point preparing -- excuse me
23 -- presenting our testimony or evidence.
24 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: In fact I
25 was -- I think I might have mentioned that in my

1 motion. If there was some person you needed to cross
2 examine and call him back, that's fine. That's fine.
3 Let's address these issues I have here.
4 Let's take the most troublesome first because I'm not
5 too sure we have enough in front of me, and this is --
6 Mr. Mendenhall, this one concerning the Consent --
7 we'll talk about the Consent Decree. You say that this
8 proceeding -- present proceeding that I'm hearing now
9 doesn't comply with a Consent Decree that was signed in
10 front of Judge Gettleman in '92. Am I correct?
11 MR. MENDENHALL: I believe that's 1999, Mr.
12 Vaira.
13 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: '99. And
14 that was a Consent Decree between the GEB Attorney and
15 the Chicago District Council?
16 MR. MENDENHALL: As well as the United States
17 Government, Mr. Vaira, yes.
18 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Okay. Let
19 me hear you on that.
20 MR. MENDENHALL: Yes. Specifically we
21 appeared in court in front of Judge Moran last
22 Thursday, and at that time the issue was raised by
23 LIUNA that the proceeding that we're involved in today
24 was governed under the Consent Decree. The following
25 day -- actually I take it back. That same day they

1 filed a Motion to Dismiss, and I quote from page five
2 of that motion, "Second, as reflected in LIUNA's motion
3 for relatedness under the Consent Decree entered in the
4 case pending before Judge Gettleman, this Court has
5 exclusive jurisdiction of all matters relating to the
6 organized crime influence on the Chicago Laborers'
7 District Council and its affiliated Local Unions,
8 including Local 1001."
9 Moreover, as was reflected throughout the
10 hearing, they have now moved this matter -- they are
11 attempting to move this matter from Judge Moran to
12 Judge Gettleman, and that is up at 9:15 tomorrow. And
13 Mr. Hearing Officer, I respectfully say that that
14 matter should be resolved before we undertake a process
15 here of hearing evidence when under the Consent Decree
16 there's a separate Adjudications Officer, Judge Seymour
17 Simon, as you mentioned, and there's a separate
18 Monitor, Mr. Miller. So I would hate for this Court or
19 this -- for you to spend time hearing an issue that,
20 according to LIUNA, you have no jurisdiction over.
21 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: You know
22 that when they say LIUNA, you'll hear that a thousand
23 times here.
24 Is the issue -- the issue before the federal
25 judges and -- is that an issue of simply jurisdiction

1 whether or not -- as you know, in any Trusteeship if
2 the Hearing Officer, no matter this Union or other
3 Unions, rules against the Local Union and puts them in
4 a Trusteeship, as a matter of course, I believe it's
5 Chapter 3 or Section 3 of the Illinois -- the losing
6 party goes into Federal Court. And your Local has
7 contended that they are a public rather than private
8 Union and therefore the LMRDA doesn't apply.
9 Gentlemen, is that the issue that's before
10 the Federal Court rather than whether or not leaving us
11 to comply with the Consent Decree. Is that it? That
12 jumps out at me here.
13 MR. MENDENHALL: Mr. Hearing Officer, if Mr.
14 Thomas has some comments, I'm more than willing to
15 defer and then I can answer your question.
16 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: See where
17 I'm going here, I'm --
18 MR. MENDENHALL: Mr. Thomas, how would you
19 like to do it? Would you like to address it or I can
20 address it.
21 MR. THOMAS: I would love to be heard. I'm
22 waiting for you --
23 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Okay.
24 Okay. Gentlemen, you're all going to be heard, and I'm
25 fairly familiar with this. But these proceedings that

1 may be sort of a hybrid. Is that the issue that I just
2 addressed?
3 MR. THOMAS: Mr. Vaira, let me try to give
4 you a little background on the collateral litigation
5 here.
6 When these Trusteeship papers were filed,
7 some period after that Local 1001 filed a court action
8 in State Court.
9 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: State
10 Court, yes.
11 MR. THOMAS: And the relief sought -- and I
12 want to emphasize this. The relief sought was a
13 continuance of these proceedings so that Mr. Webb could
14 handle the matter in January. And the representation
15 made there was that A, there was a right to counsel,
16 and B, that they were being denied their right to
17 counsel and so forth.
18 For the record, today, on November 11th, we
19 have three separate attorneys representing Local 1001.
20 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Aside from
21 that.
22 MR. THOMAS: The issue then was -- as it
23 evolved, the International then removed the case to
24 Federal Court where it is now. And their emergency
25 motions for requests for preliminary injunctions and so

1 forth have all been denied. The matter is still
2 pending and has not been dismissed, and I'm not as
3 familiar with the procedural facts and so forth. I
4 guess there is some question about whether it stays
5 with the judge it has now or whether it goes to Judge
6 Gettleman. And there is, I believe -- maybe it's not
7 been filed yet, but I believe there's some talk that
8 the Local thinks it ought to be remanded back to State
9 Court. But that's the jurisdictional issue that you
10 pointed out and that I think is in play here.
11 The references that Mr. Mendenhall makes to
12 Mr. Luskin's pleadings in the federal case are
13 jurisdictional in nature. In other words, it's part of
14 the removal papers where the Local is saying it
15 shouldn't be in Federal Court, it should be in State
16 Court. And Mr. Luskin is saying, "No, no, no, no. The
17 LMRDA covers this, and these are exclusively federal
18 matters. In fact, this is under the umbrella of the
19 Consent Decree that was filed in 1999." It is not
20 saying -- and this is my basic point here. It is not
21 saying that this Trusteeship action is brought pursuant
22 to the Consent Decree. That is wrong. He is simply
23 saying that the Federal Court has jurisdiction over the
24 dispute that the Local filed.
25 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: That's what

1 I'm honing in on. I think Mr. Mendenhall is saying
2 that plus something else. I think Mr. Mendenhall was
3 saying, "Yes, there is a dispute, but it ought to be
4 heard in State Court or Federal Court. But if it's
5 heard in Federal Court, this Consent Decree that was
6 entered between the Government and the GEB and in front
7 of Judge Gettleman, has been violated because the GEB
8 should have gone to Judge Gettleman." Am I right?
9 MR. MENDENHALL: Yes. And you hit the nail
10 exactly on the head, Mr. Vaira. I would add a couple
11 of very important points.
12 Mr. Thomas, I believe, without any intent
13 inaccurately stated -- our Motion for Preliminary
14 Injunction has never been denied. They just denied our
15 Motion to Stay the Remand Hearing. And the
16 significance of that, your Honor, is once the case if
17 it is indeed remanded and this hearing is not over, we
18 will be going into court to enjoin this proceeding. So
19 when he states that this injunction has been denied, I
20 respectfully disagree with my esteemed colleague.
21 And secondly and equally important, if Judge
22 Gettleman holds that he does have jurisdiction and this
23 case is covered by the Consent Decree, we will be
24 asking Judge Gettleman to dismiss or stay this
25 proceeding one, pending Mr. Luskin going through the

1 Monitor as required under the Consent Decree; two,
2 appointing the Adjudications Officer as required under
3 the Consent Decree; three, allowing us to use the
4 subpoena power as required under the Consent Decree;
5 and four, our right -- all of our other rights under
6 the Consent Decree; and five, and more importantly, the
7 opportunity, we think, to get Mr. Webb -- it's not
8 about a 60 day continuance. It's about a right to
9 counsel of choice. Whether or not we have that, that
10 goes to the merits. The merits have never been
11 reached. Mr. Vaira, I am sure you want Local 1001 to
12 have the best possible representation as I assume Mr.
13 Thomas does. So we're all in agreement on that issue.
14 So it's those two issues that I respectfully
15 think are before you -- before the Federal Court as to
16 the Consent Decree and before the State Court. So
17 again, I believe counsel misspoke when he said they
18 denied our preliminary injunction.
19 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: I know. I
20 personally think that it belongs in -- that this is a
21 case that belongs in Federal Court, but someone could
22 disagree with me. But, here is my more important
23 question. What in the world does the Consent Decree
24 signed by Judge Gettleman say? What is it? I mean I'm
25 looking at it and it's one of those -- hasn't that

1 expired?
2 MR. THOMAS: I don't believe it has expired
3 yet. I didn't specifically ask Mr. Luskin that, but
4 let me -- whether or not it has expired. I can answer
5 your question on the merits.
6 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: I have the
7 impression from somebody that it has expired, it's
8 finalized, and Justice Seymour Simon doesn't -- isn't
9 going to be given anymore cases, and any disciplinary
10 cases would come to me. There's something about that.
11 Now somebody will have to put that on the record to
12 figure it out, all right?
13 MR. THOMAS: Yes, I'm happy to do that.
14 Whether or not it has expired or is about to
15 expire, I don't know the answer to that question. But
16 let me -- but my response -- the answer to that
17 question will not matter as I'll explain.
18 The Consent Decree -- and I've confirmed -- I
19 read this closely and I've confirmed it now with Mr.
20 Luskin. The Consent Decree was designed in part to
21 expand the jurisdictional powers here of the reform
22 process. It did not limit Mr. Luskin's power under the
23 Constitution or the EDP or the Ethical Practices Code.
24 Rather it gave supplemental jurisdiction to Mr. Miller
25 and the Government and -- for matters arising

1 exclusively under the Consent Decree. And the language
2 that is quoted by Mr. Mendenhall in his motion says,
3 that "The Monitor shall have the power under the
4 Consent Decree." So in other words, if the Monitor
5 says, "I'm bringing an action against the Local or an
6 individual under this Consent Decree because you're
7 violating the terms of the Consent Decree," he has the
8 power to do that.
9 He also has the power to ask Mr. Luskin to
10 handle the case if he would like to. That is
11 independent and supplemental to Mr. Luskin's long
12 standing authority under the EDP and the Constitution
13 to bring whatever actions he in his discretion feels is
14 appropriate.
15 So what is completely in error about this
16 motion is the notion that somehow the Consent Decree
17 removed Mr. Luskin's authority to bring whatever
18 actions he feels is appropriate. That is not what the
19 Consent Decree says. That's not what was intended.
20 Mr. Luskin was emphatic about this when I talked to him
21 on the phone.
22 The logical assumption of that would be that
23 when the Consent Decree expires there's no reform
24 process. No. The reality is that Mr. Miller was going
25 to take on certain matters in his discretion, and if he

1 wanted help from Mr. Luskin, he could get help from Mr.
2 Luskin through a referral. But that was independent of
3 Mr. Luskin's long-standing authority to bring whatever
4 actions he deems appropriate under the Constitution and
5 under the EDP, which is not the same thing as the
6 Consent Decree. The Consent Decree point that is being
7 raised in this motion is only the point about the LMRDA
8 and the federal jurisdiction.
9 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Gentlemen,
10 what's the proceeding before Judge Gettleman tomorrow?
11 MR. MENDENHALL: It's their motion to
12 transfer it from Judge Moran to Judge Gettleman because
13 it falls under this Consent Decree.
14 And Mr. Vaira, here is something that I think
15 is absolutely critical. On page nine of the Consent
16 Decree -- Mr. Thomas had just made a representation to
17 you, I believe, that isn't -- again I believe it was an
18 honest mistake. But if you go to the bottom of page
19 nine, the last sentence states: "Notwithstanding any
20 Delegation --
21 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Let me get
22 there.
23 MR. MENDENHALL: I sure will. Take your
24 time, Mr. Vaira.
25 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER:

1 "Notwithstanding any -- it's underlined here. This is
2 probably your -- you gave it to me so I could see it.
3 Go ahead. "Notwithstanding --
4 MR. MENDENHALL: "Nothwithstanding any
5 Delegation to investigate or prosecute, no charge may
6 be brought under this decree without the consent and
7 approval of the Monitor. The Monitor must also approve
8 the disposition or settlement of any charge brought
9 pursuant to his authority."
10 Mr. Vaira, to say that this decree does not
11 limit Mr. Luskin's authority, again, my esteemed
12 colleague, I believe, misspoke in error.
13 MR. THOMAS: Mr. Vaira --
14 MR. MENDENHALL: Can I finish, Mr. Thomas?
15 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Go ahead.
16 Go ahead.
17 MR. MENDENHALL: Equally important, right
18 above that sentence in this paragraph, "LIUNA -- it's
19 under the paragraph "LIUNA Internal Reform Officials".
20 So this is clearly intended to be encompassed within
21 the reform process on page nine, the heading of that,
22 Mr. Vaira.
23 Two sentences down starting with "Recognizing
24 the success of the efforts of the Inspector General and
25 the GEB Attorney in attacking organized crime influence

1 in the CLDC and its affiliated entities and the
2 substantial commitment of time and resources they have
3 made, the Monitor may designate the GEB Attorney and/or
4 the Inspector General to act on his behalf to
5 investigate and prosecute charges under this decree
6 whenever it is reasonable or efficient to do so."
7 Period, end quote.
8 Again, Mr. Vaira, I respectfully suggest my
9 esteemed colleague misspoke in error.
10 MR. THOMAS: May I respond to that?
11 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: All right.
12 Go ahead.
13 MR. THOMAS: The words that Mr. Mendenhall
14 just read to you on their face apply to matters arising
15 under the Consent Decree.
16 On page nine the language that Mr. Mendenhall
17 just read to you in the middle of the page, those
18 underlined lines it says: "Act on his behalf to
19 investigate and prosecute charges under this decree."
20 It does not say under the EDP. It does not say under
21 the language of the Constitution. It says "under this
22 decree." It is a supplemental grant of jurisdiction.
23 At the bottom of the page, where Mr.
24 Mendenhall says I'm mistaken, it says "Nothwithstanding
25 any Delegation to investigate or prosecute, no charge

1 may be brought under this decree without the consent
2 and approval of the Monitor." That means what it says.
3 It means the Monitor can charge pursuant to the grant
4 of authority in the Consent Decree. It says nothing --
5 there is nothing in this document and there's nothing
6 in the intent of the parties that ever said that Mr.
7 Luskin would cease to have his authority to bring
8 Trusteeship cases and disciplinary cases under the
9 Constitution and the EDP.
10 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Gentlemen,
11 I have -- I understand what's going on. Here is -- it
12 will be interesting to see what Judge Gettleman rules
13 tomorrow. But in the meantime I'm going to deny this
14 motion for this reason: Based -- I'll just take it
15 piece by piece. I'm not ruling whether or not this
16 should be in Federal Court or State Court, whoever has
17 that jurisdiction. I have jurisdiction beyond that.
18 That as to who, I'll have to answer to. So I will
19 proceed not being concerned with whether it will be in
20 State Court or Federal Court.
21 The issue concerning whether or not the
22 Consent Decree governs this proceeding, I'm ruling I
23 don't have to reach that -- or I do reach it. Because
24 as I read the Consent Decree, that has to do with the
25 powers given to the GEB Attorney and the Monitor to

1 pursue disciplinary charges that were heretofore before
2 the EDP never existed. The power that I have sitting
3 here today doesn't come from that. It comes from the
4 Constitution and the history of this Union being able
5 to put its own Local Unions into receivership. And
6 this existed long before the EDP. That's the power I
7 have. I sit in that position very similar to the power
8 I had when I was the Election Officer. My power is
9 derived from the Constitution and not from the EDP. So
10 I rule that in a Trusteeship my power comes from the
11 Constitution and has nothing to do with a Consent
12 Decree in front of a judge.
13 I do not have to reach the issue of whether
14 somebody brought a criminal -- not criminal, but
15 disciplinary charge here that it might not fall under
16 Judge Gettleman. But the Trusteeship, no.
17 MR. MENDENHALL: Mr. Vaira, just to be heard.
18 And we respect the ruling that you just made, but on
19 page 16 of the Consent Decree, paragraph (g)
20 specifically states, and I read into the record again,
21 "Any failure to comply with any such request may be
22 used by the Adjudications Officer to determine whether
23 such entity or person should be subject to the
24 imposition of Trusteeship, supervision, or discipline,
25 as appropriate."

1 So again, Mr. Vaira, I respectfully say this
2 Consent Decree was designed to cover Trusteeship
3 matters as well, and we would simply like to preserve
4 our record on that point.
5 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: I
6 understand.
7 MR. MENDENHALL: We respect again your ruling
8 and thank you for your time in this matter.
9 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: I
10 understand. I understand. As I said, it's a matter of
11 history. I do not believe that the Monitor ever
12 brought the Trusteeship.
13 MR. THOMAS: If I may, Mr. Vaira. More to
14 the point is, if Mr. Mendenhall is right that the
15 Monitor or the Adjudication Officers have authority to
16 handle Trusteeship matters, again, that's besides the
17 point. It's supplemental. Both had authority. The
18 point I'm raising is the Monitor may have had the
19 authority to file a Trusteeship action against the
20 Local pursuant to his authority under the Consent
21 Decree. Mr. Luskin, without question, has authority to
22 do the same thing pursuant to his authority under the
23 Constitution and the EDP.
24 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Gentlemen,
25 if you're briefing this tomorrow or whatever you're

1 doing, I also direct your attention to the -- a similar
2 Consent Decree in front of the Teamsters, and you ought
3 to explore whether Judge Lacy, the Independent Monitor,
4 or whatever he was called, actually had power of
5 Trusteeships.
6 All right. Now having ruled upon that, let's
7 move to the next part.
8 Mr. Mendenhall, what are you -- take your
9 pick.
10 MR. MENDENHALL: Okay. The next one I would
11 like to raise is, we'll probably do it in a series of
12 motions, Mr. Vaira, and that's the Motion in Limine
13 Regarding Evidence relating to Mr. Spignola, (sic) Mr.
14 Kumerow, Mr. Caruso, and Mr. Palermo. And we're
15 specifically asking in this regard, Mr. Vaira, is the
16 allegations that a Trusteeship is warranted because the
17 current Executive Board is comprised of -- four of the
18 seven members are alleged associates of organized
19 crime.
20 Your Honor, Mr. Spignola is dead and hasn't
21 been involved with the Local since 1982, 21 years ago.
22 How that is relevant to 2800 members in a Trusteeship?
23 We respectfully say it has no relevance in this
24 proceeding, and we would ask that any relevance
25 relating to Mr. Spignola be eliminated and not allowed

1 in this proceeding, Mr. Vaira.
2 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Let me
3 address these three as you go. I've said this, I
4 hinted at this in one of my motions. We do not need to
5 take this back to the time of Samuel Gompers,
6 (phonetic) all right? There was -- I ruled that in the
7 Trusteeship of the District Council, which was right
8 before us, there was a lot of history of organized time
9 and the labor movement, and we brought it all the way
10 up to the 30's with Sam Giancana and up to the present.
11 Having done that I say it's time now to move on and not
12 -- now keep this in mind that there is a principle, and
13 I've ruled on this several times, once in a Trusteeship
14 in Pittsburgh, that organized crime doesn't -- doesn't
15 undergo a change and walk away one warm afternoon.
16 Time has to pass and there has to be some demonstration
17 that it's occurred.
18 Having said that, there is a history in
19 Chicago of organized crime with the labor movement, and
20 I found that a number of times and I've been pretty
21 definite about it. How far back we're going to go and
22 how far this is going to go -- I warn you. I don't
23 want to come here and hear stories about Spingola and
24 the funeral parlor, being called in and Sam Giancana
25 sending him messages and so forth. I need to go

1 backward.
2 Now, here's what I'm saying. I'm not going
3 -- granting but I'm not denying this motion. I'm just
4 going to say I'm going to deal with questions of
5 relevance, and I do not want to hear long, long
6 histories. I've ruled that some of these individuals,
7 not some of the more recent ones, have been tied to
8 organized crime. You're going to have to demonstrate
9 to me that -- forget about Spingola. That's so far
10 back.
11 MR. THOMAS: May I be heard on this?
12 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Okay. What
13 I'm looking for is -- I'm going to deny this motion to
14 this extent. I don't want to hear this chapter and
15 verse about things that occurred in the 80's, and '85
16 and so forth. But, if you have some reference back
17 that there is some logical reference that I or a
18 reviewing Court could say, "Yes, I understand what that
19 connection is," that's fine. But I can't go into a
20 great extent of that.
21 MR. THOMAS: Right. I think I can answer --
22 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: I'm going
23 to let you answer. I'm saying I'm looking for
24 relevance. You have to tie it in as you go.
25 MR. THOMAS: Understood.

1 The intent here is to focus to the extent
2 possible on recent events and recent debriefings of
3 informants concerning, you know, the current
4 leadership. Now in the context of making that factual
5 representation, obviously there are connections that
6 need to be made. I mean if Mr. O'Rourke talks about
7 Mr. Gironda, it's clearly of some relevance what his
8 connection is to the Carusos, what he may have done
9 with the Carusos at different points in his life and so
10 forth. So it would be literally impossible, I would
11 suggest, or seriously misleading to put on a case that
12 had no relevance to the past. And that's not -- what I
13 have been intending to do from the very beginning here
14 is to simply ask you to take judicial notice of your
15 previous findings as contained in the exhibits -- and
16 the Appellate Officer's confirmance of those findings,
17 which are confined in Exhibits 2 through 5 in the
18 proceedings. And I don't plan on having Mr. O'Rourke
19 really talk that much about that prior evidence at all.
20 Those are all matters that have been found.
21 Now as he talks about the current members of
22 Local 1001, including the current officers, if there is
23 a reference to someone in the past, I expect him to
24 raise that, but I don't expect him to dwell on it. And
25 I think it would be -- with respect to all of these

1 motions in limine that Mr. Mendenhall has filed, my
2 response would be the same is that those go to the
3 weight, not to the admissibility. It is of some weight
4 that these people may have had a connection that can be
5 demonstrated down through time. It may be less and
6 less probative the further generations down you go, but
7 it is of some weight. So the issue is really to allow
8 the record in and let him draw those connections, and
9 you can draw whatever inferences or conclusions you
10 wish.
11 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: What I'm
12 going to ask is what -- we may take judicial notice but
13 I want a connection. I want some articulable
14 connection that as we go -- I'm now in 2003 and
15 something that occurred in '85, you know, there's -- is
16 beginning to diminish.
17 MR. MENDENHALL: May I be heard briefly?
18 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Okay.
19 MR. MENDENHALL: And that's -- and I agree
20 with you. One of the things we're asking, in Mr.
21 Caruso's statement they reference a dice game he
22 attended in 1969. We're in 2003. They say he attended
23 a dice game in 1969, put the Local 1001 in Trusteeship.
24 Your Honor, our request would be exactly what
25 you're saying. We would say grant our motion because

1 there's no relevance to the fact that Caruso attended a
2 dice game in 1969 to support putting the Local 1001 in
3 Trusteeship today.
4 It would be our argument that there's no
5 relevance that Spignola had a meeting with Anthony
6 Accardo in 1974, so put Local 1001 in Trusteeship
7 today.
8 It would be our argument that Ernest Kumerow,
9 who resigned over a decade ago, is not relevant. Any
10 interaction with him with his father-in-law is not
11 relevant to putting Local 1001 into Trusteeship in
12 2003.
13 Please do not visit the sins of the third and
14 fourth generation on this generation of leadership.
15 Let them rise and fall on their own merits. If he has
16 evidence against this current Executive Board, let him
17 bring it, your Honor. But this is far too important to
18 their lives, to their reputations, and to their honor
19 to allow him to reference a dice game from 1969 and
20 meetings in the 60's, 70's, and 80's before they came
21 into power. Let them rise or fall on their merits,
22 your Honor. And that's all we ask.
23 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: What I'm
24 saying is, and Mr. Thomas has seen me do this a number
25 of times. Sometimes -- quite often I will hear some

1 evidence and then decide at the end that I'm going to
2 exclude it. And I don't employ a method of
3 automatically excluding something if I have some
4 problems with it, but I will weigh it as I go. But I'm
5 giving you some warnings that I'm looking for some
6 qualifications here.
7 MR. THOMAS: Completely understood. And my
8 presentation of the evidence is going to be very much
9 focused on the more recent time frame as has always
10 been my expectation.
11 I would draw one distinction though in
12 response to Mr. Mendenhall's comments. I have
13 virtually no intention here of talking about conduct of
14 people thirty years ago. But, their status in
15 organized crime as opposed to their conduct is a
16 different matter. In other words, if it's the
17 testimony of Mr. O'Rourke that not only is the Local
18 currently controlled by organized crime but always has
19 been, that is clearly relevant to your determination as
20 to whether a Trusteeship is imposed. I don't need to
21 put on evidence and you certainly don't need to find
22 facts about what Mr. Kumerow or Mr. Accardo or Mr.
23 Caruso were doing 20, 30 years ago. But the ultimate
24 testimony that Mr. O'Rourke, based on information that
25 he's gotten from law enforcement and from his

1 informants that this Local has, not only in the recent
2 time frame but in its entire time frame, been
3 controlled by organized crime is clearly relevant. The
4 continuity of that and the lack of contested elections
5 during that entire period, for example, is all part of
6 the larger story.
7 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: You heard
8 my message. We're looking at what's this Local doing
9 today. And if you have to give me some history of how
10 we got here, it has to be pretty relevant, all right?
11 The law and history of organized crime and the labor
12 movement in Chicago, we're past that now. We've moved
13 on and we're beginning to go narrow it down and zero in
14 on the focus, okay?
15 MR. THOMAS: Very good.
16 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: I think you
17 have a couple of more here, Mr. Mendenhall.
18 MR. MENDENHALL: I sure do. And your Honor,
19 in an effort to move it along, we will go to the next
20 Motion in Limine which ties in, and that's Local 1001's
21 "Motion In Limine to Strike All Pre-1995 Allegations
22 Regarding Organized Crime and to Preclude the Use of
23 Any Related Evidence."
24 Now we're getting past just the individuals,
25 former Board members, Kumerow, Caruso, Spignola, but

1 there's references again to Tony Accardo with no tie-in
2 and information to the present. And the reason that's
3 significant, your Honor, I spent a considerable amount
4 of time getting prepared for this case, reading the
5 Coia decision where you specifically addressed this
6 issue and you said, "Pre-1995 there wasn't an EDP in
7 place, and it did not -- I want to make sure I quote it
8 directly accurate, your Honor.
9 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: I've read
10 your -- go ahead.
11 MR. MENDENHALL: "As for historical problems
12 with organized crime, Hearing Officer Vaira has stated,
13 "Prior to the adoption of the EDP, disciplinary charges
14 were limited to violations of the Constitution.
15 Associating with organized crime had never been the
16 subject of disciplinary charges." Period. "The IHO's
17 independent research has found no charges brought in
18 any Union for associating with unsavory or underworld
19 figures prior to the Consent Decree arising out of the
20 litigation between the DOJ and the Teamsters."
21 Then you go on to state, "Until the adoption
22 of the EDP in 1995, the charge of associating with a
23 member of organized crime was not grounds for dismissal
24 from LIUNA."
25 And you cite that in the Coia opinion. And

1 we would simply say, your Honor, we be afforded the
2 same respect with regard to pre-1995 evidence. I don't
3 want to belabor this point too much because a lot of it
4 ties into our previous motions where you said you're
5 looking for what this current Board has done wrong.
6 And that's basically where we're going with this one as
7 well, your Honor.
8 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: I think
9 there's some distinction here.
10 Prior to 1995 there was no EDP yet here in
11 this Union, also in the Teamsters. There was really
12 know (sic no ) offense of associating with organized crime
13 figures. This particular statute or provision and also
14 the one that governs the Teamsters made almost
15 retroactive that if you -- any activity that an
16 individual had in the past, if it's relevant to its
17 present activity, is relevant. You may look at it.
18 And we've used that a number of times saying, "This
19 person has been associated with organized crime since
20 1985. He's still associated with it. It affects his
21 presentability in the Union."
22 Mr. Coia's very different. There was a
23 number of what I call wild card charges against Mr.
24 Coia. They were accusing Mr. Coia of not doing
25 anything about Mr. Serpico and appointing Mr. Serpico

1 as a head of a Hearings Panel, a panel similar to this.
2 And the GEB Attorney said that that was an indication
3 that he was giving him a pass and he was really not
4 doing anything with him.
5 Those comments that I made were in this
6 context: Mr. Coia was trying to get rid of Mr.
7 Serpico. He had a grudge fight with him, a real
8 battle, and it was his way of bouncing him out of the
9 Union by isolating him. And there was evidence that
10 Mr. Coia said, "Now we got to move in here. That's the
11 end of Mr. Serpico. He's out." The GEB Attorney said
12 he could have done more and I said he could not have
13 done more. Now that -- it was in that context. So I'm
14 not going to deny anything prior to 1995 with this
15 caveat it better be relevant.
16 MR. THOMAS: Of course. I mean that would
17 would stand to reason.
18 I have a couple of points. Number one, the
19 language that was quoted is in the context of a
20 disciplinary case. And obviously charging conduct
21 pursuant to the EDP -- that occurred prior to the EDP
22 is problematic. That's what that language refers to.
23 If you're going to say, "You violated the EDP," and
24 then you refer to something that happened before there
25 was an EDP, well there's clearly a notice problem

1 there. That's not what we're dealing with here. Here
2 we're dealing with a historical pattern of organized
3 crime control, and it is relevant to your consideration
4 how far back this problem goes.
5 I recognize completely that you're expecting,
6 and I will provide to you, evidence that the Union
7 still is connected to the "Outfit". But it is clearly
8 relevant to put on evidence saying that these patterns
9 go back far in time.
10 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Keep in
11 mind, gentlemen, this is a Trusteeship complaint. So
12 we're talking about really an issue of management
13 question. The International Union says, "As a matter
14 of management we want to remove the control from these
15 individuals because they shouldn't be managers. And
16 the reason for that is their association with organized
17 crime." They're not charging them with it, but they're
18 certainly saying that they are. And so we're talking
19 about a management question. And when you look at it
20 you come at it from a -- not an entirely different
21 perspective, but the purpose of the information coming
22 in is different.
23 MR. THOMAS: This will be entirely different
24 if we were talking about a disciplinary case against,
25 say, Mr. Gironda. And if I came into court here and I

1 had only evidence against Mr. Gironda that was 1985 and
2 prior, I would be the first one to say that's a problem
3 and that I shouldn't do that. But for Trusteeship
4 purposes, the organized crime control of this Local in
5 the 1960's is relevant. It's not as relevant as
6 control in the 90's and the current decade, but it has
7 a historical evidentiary value.
8 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Okay. One
9 more remark and then we'll take a break.
10 MR. MENDENHALL: One very brief remark, Mr.
11 Vaira. And again I think you touched on it as
12 succinctly as anybody has in this room, and that's if
13 this Local is placed in Trusteeship, let it be on the
14 sins of the current administration. Do not visit the
15 sins of the father, the grandfather, and the great
16 grandfather, four generations of prior business
17 managers before these people were in the Union. These
18 are hard working men and women. To say that this is
19 only a Trusteeship proceeding, when my client calls me
20 and says his wife's in tears, they're accusing him of
21 being a bookmaker for X, Y, Z, or that he's a drug
22 dealer, your Honor, that goes beyond a Trusteeship. So
23 I disagree with that claim, your Honor, and that's why
24 I say give us the chance. If they can show this
25 current administration is going improperly, and if

1 there are some problems, they were honest mistakes.
2 Give us the chance to go forward. Don't put us in
3 Trusteeship over a 1960 dice game or a 1950, '60
4 meeting with Anthony Accardo before any of these fine
5 gentlemen became involved in the labor movement. Thank
6 you, your Honor.
7 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: All right.
8 Madam Reporter, you probably want a break. We'll give
9 you a break. Take yourself fifteen minutes.
10 (Whereupon a break was taken in
11 the proceedings after which the
12 following proceedings were had:)
13 MR. MENDENHALL: Your Honor, if I could just
14 very briefly, and -- there's only three promises I will
15 make today. One, I promise you this will be the
16 easiest motion. Two, I promised my daughter I would
17 come home tonight. I worked through the night last
18 night. So she called and said she missed me. And
19 three, I promise my clients I'm going to give them my
20 all.
21 The clients would like to have the -- we
22 represent 2800 members, and a lot of them work for the
23 City of Chicago in very important job functions to the
24 City, trash removal, things of that nature, and they
25 cannot attend the hearing during the day, but would

1 love to have the opportunity to attend it on a Saturday
2 or if part of it is held in the evening. I promised
3 them I would present it to you, and I do that
4 respectfully, sir.
5 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: I've had
6 these before. The Union has generally objected to
7 this, although there have been some accommodations. The
8 last time we have done it when we had the general --
9 the Chicago one we did it all during the day. I
10 understand that there is some difficulty in doing that.
11 I just have to deal with the lawyers and the efficiency
12 of this order. What you're requesting is that we do
13 part of this on a Saturday?
14 MR. MENDENHALL: Or even in an evening. A
15 lot of them get off, it's my understanding, between
16 3:30 and 5:00. Again, whatever works best for you.
17 MR. LYDON: I think I had a conversation with
18 Mr. Thomas and we talked about this.
19 MR. THOMAS: He talked about if we -- I'm
20 glad Mr. Lydon raised that because I did not agree with
21 what was described to you that -- maybe we had those
22 discussions a while back about whether his schedule
23 could be accommodated. We talked about whether
24 alternative dates could be squeezed in, and we talked
25 about well, if we did it the 20th and 21st, and maybe

1 we could go part of Saturday and so forth, we never
2 finished that conversation because the client didn't
3 agree to that. I never agreed to hold anything on
4 Saturday. I'm always open to talk about what is
5 possible and what needs to be done. As a practical
6 matter it creates huge difficulties both for the
7 lawyers and for the witnesses to do things in the
8 evenings and on Saturday.
9 But I would like to point out today is a
10 Federal holiday. If this concern were genuinely coming
11 from these people, they would be here today. They're
12 not working today. It's a federal holiday. So if this
13 were really a burning desire, one would think at least
14 a few of these people would be here today.
15 MR. MENDENHALL: Your Honor, if I may briefly
16 respond to that. I promise you as an officer of the
17 court at a Union membership meeting I attended the
18 members stood up and asked if they could attend some of
19 the hearing. They work during the day. These are
20 County and Municipal employees. They are not off on a
21 federal holiday. And Mr. Vaira, ironically you know
22 that relates to our whole issue if we're in State Court
23 or Federal Court, we're all Municipal employees. So
24 what the federal government is doing -- our clients are
25 working today, your Honor, and truly would like to

1 attend. I didn't say all of the hearings. I'm just
2 asking for even at best, your Honor, maybe a small
3 portion where the members can come and show that this
4 means a lot to them. And again, that if you take this
5 Union from them, it be done based on the current
6 administration's alleged misconduct. And that's all
7 they ask for. And again, your Honor, as an officer of
8 the court, they asked that of me and I'm relaying it to
9 you. And I thank you for your consideration.
10 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Any
11 situation where at the end of these -- toward the end
12 of a proceeding, the members are permitted to say what
13 they want to say, and that may be the occasion for us
14 to hold an after hours session to permit them to come.
15 I've never been overwhelmed with the amount of
16 participation, but we'll -- that may be a situation
17 where they can come and voice their concern, and
18 they're entitled to it. This is theirs, and they're
19 allowed to speak out, and we might be able to arrange
20 that.
21 MR. MENDENHALL: Thank you.
22 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Okay. Now,
23 where are we, gentlemen?
24 MR. FARACI: Mr. Hearing Officer, we have
25 also presented you with four separate subpoenas which

1 we're hoping we can address rather quickly. If I could
2 start with the first one. Two of them deal with
3 subpoenas for individuals.
4 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Let's --
5 just the -- let's get the show on the road, and we'll
6 deal with that -- it will take us just five minutes and
7 the lawyers can just come up and we'll chat about it
8 rather than making some formal presentation. I know
9 you put them on the record and we'll chat about what
10 we're going to do with them. All right?
11 MR. THOMAS: Very good. I'm ready to
12 proceed.
13 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Ready to
14 go?
15 MR. THOMAS: At this time GEB Attorney would
16 call John O'Rourke to the stand.
17 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Mr.
18 O'Rourke, up here and you can sit over there.
19 Mr. Thomas, we're talking about the -- just
20 for my own sake, we are talking about the current
21 officers, am I right? And the current officers and
22 somebody who just left recently. Who are we talking
23 about? Just give me names. Mr. Nick Gironda --
24 MR. THOMAS: Well, if your question is who
25 are the current officers?

1 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Yes.
2 MR. THOMAS: On Exhibit Number 1, your Honor,
3 I have what I believe is our most up to date list
4 which would indicate that Nick Gironda is the Business
5 Manager, Nathaniel Gibson is the President, Floyd
6 Grogan is the Vice President, Robert Chianelli is the
7 Recording Secretary, Sam DeChristopher is the
8 Secretary-Treasurer, Paul Reed is the Sergeant-at-Arms,
9 and then there are various auditors and so forth.
10 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: And the DC
11 means the persons who are Delegates of the District
12 Council.
13 MR. THOMAS: Right.
14 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: You'll see
15 there have been some recent changes in the last couple
16 of years, but that, I believe, is the current slate of
17 officers.
18 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: All right.
19 Mr. O'Rourke, the young lady will swear you
20 in.
21 (Witness duly sworn.)
22 MR. THOMAS: Mr. Vaira, I'm got going to go
23 into the kind of depth and detail of Mr. O'Rourke's
24 qualifications because you've already heard that
25 several times before and you have indeed made findings

1 on that. But I will put enough of it on the record so
2 that people have a sense of his background.
3 MR. LYDON: When you say "heard before,"
4 could I at least know which specific proceedings you're
5 referring to?
6 MR. THOMAS: Certainly. In the Chicago
7 District Council matter he testified at length. That's
8 Exhibit Number 2 in your exhibit books. He testified
9 at length in the Caruso and DiForti matters, which is
10 Exhibits 2, 3, and 4. And there are explicit
11 references to his testimony and to his expertise in all
12 of those matters.
13 JOHN J. O'ROURKE,
14 called as a witness on behalf of the Respondent, having
15 been first duly sworn, was examined and testified as
16 follows:
17 DIRECT EXAMINATION
18 BY
19 MR. THOMAS:
20 Q. Good morning, Mr. O'Rourke.
21 A. Good morning, sir.
22 Q. How are you currently employed?
23 A. I'm employed for Quest Consultants and as an
24 inspector for the Inspector General for LIUNA.
25 Q. So the Inspector General capacity is part of

1 your current employment as a private investigator.
2 A. Yes, sir.
3 Q. Again, Mr. Vaira is well familiar with your
4 background, but others in the room may not be. Could
5 you summarize for us your prior career in law
6 enforcement?
7 A. Yes, sir. I had a total of 32 years in law
8 enforcement, six years with the Office of Navel
9 Intelligence as a Special Agent and Supervisory Special
10 Agent, and 26 years as a Special Agent with the Federal
11 Bureau of Investigation, and a year and three to four
12 months with the FBI as a Cook County Inspector assigned
13 to the Task Force in the Organized Crime and Property
14 Crime Task Force.
15 Q. How many years were you actually employed by
16 the FBI?
17 A. As a Special Agent, 26 years, and then
18 assigned to the FBI for another year and three months.
19 Q. How much of your time in the FBI was involved
20 with organized crime investigations?
21 A. Approximately 23 years.
22 Q. Did you receive any awards or commendations
23 for your service to the FBI?
24 A. Yes, sir. I received commendations from the
25 Director of the FBI and from various police officials

1 and a commendation from the Chamber of Commerce for law
2 enforcement excellence.
3 Q. Was this on one occasion or more than one
4 occasion?
5 A. More than one occasion. Approximately a
6 hundred commendations. That's an estimate.
7 Q. How many Chicago Organized Crime
8 investigations do you think you've been involved in?
9 A. Investigations, several hundred.
10 Q. And again limiting the question to your time
11 in the Bureau, how many cases have you been involved in
12 that have actually lead to convictions of organized
13 crime figures here?
14 A. Approximately 75 either as a case agent or as
15 a team of agents working on a case.
16 Q. Have you been qualified as an expert witness
17 before?
18 A. Yes, sir, by Mr. Vaira in previous hearings.
19 Q. And specifically the Chicago District Council
20 matter and the Caruso and DiForti matters?
21 A. Yes, sir, and the John Galioto matter and
22 John Matassa, Local 2 matter.
23 MR. THOMAS: Mr. Vaira, referring in part to
24 the prior records, I would offer Mr. O'Rourke's
25 testimony as that of an expert in the field of

1 organized crime influence in Chicago, particularly with
2 respect to Labor Unions.
3 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: I found
4 that before. I still find it.
5 MR. THOMAS: Thank you.
6 BY MR. THOMAS:
7 Q. Mr. O'Rourke, how long have you been working
8 LIUNA investigations here in Chicago?
9 A. Since May of 1996 to the present time.
10 Q. So shortly after the agreement between LIUNA
11 and the government?
12 A. Yes, sir.
13 Q. And when did you actually retire from the
14 Bureau?
15 A. Retired officially in I believe it was March
16 of 1995.
17 Q. So your retirement roughly coincided with the
18 imposition of this reform process.
19 A. Yes, sir.
20 Q. In the context of your doing work for LIUNA
21 in this field, have you used any of your prior
22 informants that you had when you were with the Bureau?
23 A. Yes, sir.
24 Q. Have you developed any new informants since
25 leaving the government?

1 A. Yes, I have.
2 Q. Just briefly, Mr. O'Rourke. When we refer --
3 I want to make sure our terminology is agreed upon
4 here. Does the term "crew" mean anything to you in
5 context of organized crime?
6 A. Yes.
7 Q. What is a crew?
8 A. In Chicago, unlike New York -- New York is
9 five families. In Chicago there's one family. There's
10 a "boss", and then there are subunits called "crews"
11 historically. And a crew sometimes is geographic,
12 generally speaking. And there's a Cicero Crew which
13 covers the west side and Melrose Park. There's the
14 26th Chinatown Crew. There's the Grand Avenue Crew,
15 and there's the North Side Crew or the Elmwood Park
16 Crew. It varies from time to time. Sometimes it's
17 in flux. But the crews historically have been headed
18 from the boss of the crew and then he has lieutenants
19 and individuals who work under him.
20 Q. And what businesses, legal or illegal, does
21 organized crime get involved in?
22 A. The primary thrust of organized crime in
23 Chicago and other places is illegal gambling,
24 bookmaking and to some extent, in the old days, running
25 wire rooms and card games. Out of that comes what they

1 call "juice" in Chicago, loan sharking, lending money
2 to individuals at high per cent of interest enforced by
3 the threat of violence or violence. The usual rate is
4 five per cent a week, which is 260 per cent interest a
5 year on a loan, and the principal generally doesn't go
6 down. And the third aspect of it is extortion.
7 Extorting legitimate and illegal businesses are in the
8 old days running chop shops, and then Union corruption
9 and bribery of public officials.
10 Q. What form does corruption of Labor Unions
11 take in terms of the activities of the LCN?
12 A. The LCN is "La Cosa Nostra" or "The Outfit",
13 as they call it in Chicago, historically has attempted
14 to influence and infiltrate and dominate Labor Unions
15 in order to have a place for their members and their
16 relatives, friends of members, and so on. It gives
17 them a legitimate income and it also allows them to
18 have leased cars and all of the benefits and to control
19 and have a legitimate front.
20 Q. And over the years have you seen any activity
21 with respect to Pension and Welfare Funds in the labor
22 racketeering field?
23 A. Yes, sir. Informants have advised me that
24 one of the reasons for the Mob's interest in gaining
25 influence and control over Labor Unions is so that

1 members' family, friends and associates can have access
2 to pensions and also to Health and Welfare from the
3 Union Funds.
4 Q. What does the term "made member" mean?
5 A. A "made member" is an individual who goes
6 through some sort of ceremony and then is allowed to
7 operate gambling, loan sharking, all the historical Mob
8 activities, and shares in the profits of the Mob. He's
9 generally a boss or a long-time Mob member who's
10 trusted and has been involved in violence.
11 Q. Can a person be part of organized crime
12 without being a quote, "made member"?
13 A. Yes, sir.
14 Q. How does that work?
15 A. The FBI refer to them as "associates", and
16 they come in basically two varieties. An LCN associate
17 is someone who is on the street actually doing work,
18 you know, collecting money, threatening people,
19 performing regular jobs on the street. Examples would
20 be Jerry Scarpelli who was not a "made member" who was
21 a killer, Harry Aleman who was a killer. There is a
22 whole variety of these individuals. Jimmy LaValley who
23 was an enforcer who was not a "made member".
24 The other variety of "made member" of
25 associates would be individuals who facilitate

1 organized crime activities. And these can be people
2 who are not actively involved day to day doing work --
3 organized crime work, but such as people in Labor
4 Unions who do the bidding and follow the orders of
5 organized crime and pursue their interests.
6 Q. Just so we're clear, is the term "associate"
7 a law enforcement term?
8 A. It's -- I would say yes. It's a term that
9 the Bureau decided to utilize.
10 Q. So in terms of working your informants, do
11 they use the term "associate"?
12 A. No, they do not.
13 Q. How do they distinguish between a "made
14 member" and someone who is involved but who is not a
15 "made member"?
16 A. Well they would indicate that -- they would
17 generally know who a "made member" is or a "made guy"
18 as they would say. And the reason for that is once a
19 person is a "made guy", he has all kinds of additional
20 power. And if anybody insults him or strikes him or
21 belittles him, it can cost them physically. So it
22 becomes to their interest to know pretty quickly who a
23 "made guy" is so they can show him the proper respect.
24 Sometimes they're not physical specimens, maybe older
25 men, but they know who the "made guys" are, and there

1 are not that many. They don't refer to "associates".
2 That's an FBI term. They generally talk about a
3 "connected guy" or "with the Outfit" or "he's with the
4 people," and those kinds of terms.
5 Q. When you debriefed your informants, those are
6 the distinctions that you've -- it's been "made guy"
7 versus these other phraseologies; is that right?
8 A. That's correct.
9 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: The
10 associates, am I correct, can be first class, the
11 person who is involved in completely illegal
12 activities, loan sharking, gambling, outside the law,
13 or number two, the associate who may be in a legitimate
14 line of work, doctor, lawyer, businessman, person in a
15 Union, who ostensibly is on -- inside the law but may
16 have connections to these persons in the system from
17 time to time.
18 THE WITNESS: That's correct, yes, sir.
19 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: FBI makes
20 that distinction?
21 THE WITNESS: Yes, they do.
22 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: We're going
23 to get some balance on line. Your informants don't
24 make that. They use the word "connected" or he's --
25 something like that?

1 THE WITNESS: Right. They would normally not
2 use the law enforcement term of "LCN associate".
3 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: So some
4 definitions Mr. Thomas will ask you, questions about
5 "is somebody associated with", you anticipate that you
6 will make that distinction, am I right?
7 THE WITNESS: Yes, sir.
8 MR. THOMAS: Just to be clear, to preview his
9 testimony in this regard, we are not going to make any
10 allegations that the current officers are "made
11 members" of organized crime. The allegation is that
12 they are associated with organized crime. And that's
13 why I'm laying this predicate so that we have that
14 distinction.
15 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: I
16 understand that.
17 BY MR. THOMAS:
18 Q. All right. Mr. O'Rourke, in your years in
19 law enforcement and then in your post law enforcement
20 career, what tests do you employ to test the
21 reliability of the information you're getting from
22 informants? How do you measure that?
23 A. Well the informants that were informants when
24 I was in the FBI, the Bureau used a test of results.
25 In other words, arrests made, information resulting in

1 arrests, convictions, Title III's, searches,
2 statistics. And as far as -- and then checking out
3 what they say with other informants. Testing the
4 information, checking it out as best you can.
5 Q. So just -- I want to make sure I understand
6 that correctly. When you say like a search warrant or
7 a Title III application, you're not saying that it was
8 limited to the fact that someone was able to get a
9 search warrant. It's that you could actually look at
10 what was seized and see whether the information was
11 correct after the fact?
12 A. Yes, sir. If the informant told you that Mr.
13 X driving a green car is running narcotics and you were
14 able to get a search warrant based on that and then
15 arrested Mr. X and recovered the car and recovered
16 narcotics and it resulted in a conviction, then that
17 would be a statistic and would show that the informant
18 is truthful.
19 Q. Um-hum. And the informants that you've
20 developed concerning labor racketeering here in
21 Chicago, can you speak to their reliability please.
22 A. Yes, sir. They've been reliable as far as I
23 can tell. They have a background in organized crime,
24 and they have provided information which has been found
25 through investigation to be reliable and truthful.

1 Q. Have you corroborated much or all of what
2 they said?
3 A. Yes, sir.
4 Q. I'm going to -- in just a few minutes we're
5 going to go through them individually so you can speak
6 to their individual circumstances.
7 For how long, Mr. O'Rourke, have you been
8 receiving informant information concerning Local 1001?
9 A. Probably -- I would say probably for 20
10 years, although I did not work labor racketeering in
11 the FBI. But individuals who were involved would
12 mention it and it would be -- I generally would write
13 it up and pass it on to the agents who were
14 responsible.
15 Q. Again I'll get into specifics in just a
16 moment. But what generally speaking or how generally
17 speaking would you characterize the nature of the
18 information you've been receiving during that 20 years?
19 A. Generally that organized crime influenced
20 Local 1001 in connection with the 1st Ward, Pat Marcy,
21 John D'Arco, and it was one of the power bases of the
22 Mob in the City of Chicago through being able to
23 influence and control Streets and Sanitation and the
24 other city departments.
25 Q. Has the substance or the nature of that

1 informant information changed in more recent years or
2 not?
3 A. No, sir.
4 Q. So again, speaking generally here before we
5 get into the specifics. What's the quality and nature
6 of the information you've received about 1001 in recent
7 years?
8 A. That it was controlled -- that it was
9 influenced by organized crime to their benefit as a
10 place to employ friends, relatives, LCN associates, and
11 to -- as a power base within the City of Chicago for
12 jobs in Streets and Sanitation and working in
13 conjunction with the 1st Ward which was run by Pat
14 Marcy and John D'Arco, and it was the Mob's Union.
15 Q. And as you've prepared for your testimony
16 here today and reviewed some of the names of current
17 and recent officers as well as the persons for whom
18 allegedly improper pension and welfare payments were
19 made, have you determined that organized crime
20 influence is still at issue at Local 1001?
21 A. That's what the informants indicate, yes,
22 sir.
23 Q. Now briefly, Mr. O'Rourke, if you could look
24 at Volume One of the exhibits in front of you. And
25 we've already identified it. But Exhibit Number 1 is

1 an officer history chart which sets forth the persons
2 in relevant positions going back to 1970. Do you see
3 that?
4 A. Yes, sir.
5 Q. And you've had a chance to look that over
6 before your testimony?
7 A. Yes.
8 Q. And the following four exhibits, 2 through 5,
9 are specific opinions from either the IHO or the
10 Appellate Officer. And I just want to identify those
11 for the record and ask what your involvement was in
12 these matters.
13 First is Exhibit Number 2, which is the
14 Chicago District Council opinion -- rather Order and
15 Memorandum in 97-30T. You do recall the Chicago
16 District Council matter, right?
17 A. Yes, I do.
18 Q. And did you testify at length in those
19 proceedings?
20 A. Yes, sir.
21 Q. And what generally speaking was the subject
22 matter of your testimony?
23 A. Organized crime influence and control of the
24 Chicago District Council over a period of years.
25 Q. And did that include information concerning

1 some of the officers of the District Council as well as
2 some of the constituent Locals of the District Council?
3 A. Yes, sir.
4 MR. THOMAS: Mr. Vaira, I certainly don't
5 intend to go into all the findings you made there. I
6 would -- but again, as we go through this I would ask
7 that we simply be allowed to take judicial notice of
8 your previous findings here which really can't be
9 disputed --
10 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: You may,
11 but you're going to connect it up. As we go, you can
12 point out and then tell us how that may come into play.
13 All right?
14 MR. THOMAS: Thank you.
15 BY MR. THOMAS:
16 Q. And Mr. O'Rourke, Exhibits 3, 4, and 5
17 pertain to the Bruno Caruso, et al matter which was
18 Docket 99-12D. And did you also testify at length
19 concerning those proceedings.
20 A. Yes, sir.
21 Q. Specifically about individuals' connections
22 to organized crime; correct?
23 A. Yes, sir, I did.
24 Q. And again, Mr. Caruso at the time, in
25 addition to being a former member of -- a former

1 Business Manager of the District Council, was the
2 incumbent Business Manager of Local 1001, this Union,
3 correct?
4 MR. LYDON: Could we clarify which Caruso?
5 MR. THOMAS: Bruno Caruso.
6 THE WITNESS: Yes, sir, that's correct.
7 MR. THOMAS: And again, Mr. Vaira, I would
8 like to be able to refer to portions of these
9 throughout the proceedings without having to establish
10 the whole record of your prior findings.
11 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Okay.
12 BY MR. THOMAS:
13 Q. All right. Mr. O'Rourke, I want to ask you
14 about your informants that you've developed that may
15 have information concerning present or prior members
16 and officers of Local 1001.
17 First a preliminary question. Are some of
18 these people identifiable by name and others not?
19 A. Yes, sir. There are confidential informants
20 who are individuals who provide information or are in a
21 position to provide information and do not wish to be
22 identified or testify openly for fear of their personal
23 safety.
24 The second class of individuals is
25 cooperating individuals or cooperating subjects. These

1 are individuals who provide information but will agree
2 to testify in open court and have their name --
3 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: And you
4 have in the past broken them into separate categories
5 and identified them by name; am I correct?
6 THE WITNESS: Yes.
7 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: We'll deal
8 with each of those separately and there may be some
9 different tests applied. All right? There are
10 different tests employed.
11 BY MR. THOMAS:
12 Q. Mr. O'Rourke, let's start with the people
13 that can be named. Is there a Mr. Granata that you
14 know?
15 A. Yes, sir.
16 Q. For THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER reporter,
17 spell that.
18 A. Joseph, J-o-s-e-p-h, Granata, spelled
19 G-r-a-n-a-t-a.
20 Q. Is he one of your informants?
21 A. Yes, sir. Cooperating subject.
22 Q. Tell us what you can about his background and
23 the nature of your debriefings with Mr. Granata.
24 A. Mr. Granata was a confidential informant and
25 then kind of transitioned into a cooperating subject.

1 He wore recording devices and then agreed to testify in
2 open court.
3 Q. This is back when you were in the Bureau?
4 A. Yes, sir. He was part of the Cicero Crew
5 under Joseph Ferriola, now deceased, and later with
6 Rocky Infelise. And he associated with Cicero Crew
7 members such as Harry Aleman, Butchie Petrocelli, James
8 Inendino (Phonetic) and others. He was part and parcel
9 of that crew. He was also a close associate and driver
10 for Chuckie Nicoletti, now deceased. And his father,
11 Frank Granata, who operated the Galewood or Granata
12 Funeral home, was a "made member" of organized crime.
13 His brother, Frank, Jr., Frank Granata, Jr., nickname
14 "Gigi" Granata, was also an LCN associate in the North
15 Side or Elmwood Park Crew.
16 Joe Granata was, as I said, an LCN associate
17 in the Cicero Crew, and he dealt with on a regular
18 basis -- on a daily basis organized crime figures over
19 the years. While he was an informant for the FBI or
20 cooperating subject, he wore a body recorder and made
21 narcotics arrests.
22 MR. LYDON: This is not as much a problem,
23 Mr. Hearing Officer, with where we were at the moment,
24 but I would like some clarification. He's identified
25 this man and then he's told who he's associated with.

1 But it's not at all clear how these people are members
2 of organized crime. Where we are right now I'm not
3 going to quarrel with the names that have been raised,
4 but I have concerns about as the way we proceed and how
5 it is that you can say, "Oh, this guy's a member of
6 organized crime, that guy is." It isn't something
7 Granata told -- you have to explain whether it's
8 independent or widely recognized or --
9 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: I believe
10 this is background. And when you refer to Granata, you
11 will -- I believe you will -- you debriefed him, and we
12 expect -- if you're talking he's been with Rocco
13 Infelise, we would like to know around that time how it
14 was if he's associated with Rocco Infelise. We're
15 looking for his reliability when he talks about what
16 else is going on. So -- I think you've done this
17 before and this is preliminary, but you may have to
18 particularize this as you go.
19 MR. LYDON: As I said, at the moment the
20 names aren't anything that I'm disturbed about, but I
21 can see this as a problem as we go forward.
22 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Okay. Go
23 ahead.
24 BY MR. THOMAS:
25 Q. Do you remember where you left off, Mr.

1 O'Rourke?
2 A. Yes, sir. Mr. Granata is now in the Witness
3 Security Program, and I debrief him periodically
4 telephonically.
5 Q. When is the most recent time you debriefed
6 him?
7 A. October.
8 Q. Of this year?
9 A. Of this year, yes.
10 Q. And what if anything can you say about Mr.
11 Granata's reliability as a witness?
12 A. Mr. Granata actually purchased narcotics,
13 both cocaine and heroin, from an organized crime figure
14 who was then indicted and became a fugitive, was
15 arrested and was convicted in Federal Court of that.
16 He also provided information --
17 MR. LYDON: Who?
18 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: What was
19 his name?
20 THE WITNESS: Roy Salerno, S-a-l-e-r-n-o.
21 BY MR. THOMAS:
22 Q. Over the years have you found this Mr.
23 Granata to be reliable?
24 A. Yes, sir. He also provided information about
25 an individual named Chris Messino, who was a major drug

1 dealer in the south suburbs. And he made some
2 telephone recordings, and as a result Mr. Messino was
3 convicted and sent to federal prison.
4 Q. Have you or your colleagues, either the FBI
5 or the Inspector General's Office, when necessary been
6 able to corroborate what -- the information Mr. Granata
7 has given you.
8 A. Yes. We corroborated through other
9 informants or through investigation.
10 Q. Anything else you want to say before I move
11 on -- about Mr. Granata before I move on to the next
12 name?
13 A. No, sir.
14 Q. Do you trust the information you get from Mr.
15 Granata?
16 A. Yes, sir.
17 Q. Is there a person whose last name is Cooley
18 who you've debriefed over the years?
19 A. Yes, sir.
20 Q. Who is Cooley?
21 A. Robert Cooley was a Chicago criminal attorney
22 and a former Chicago police officer. He became a
23 cooperating subject working with the FBI and the U.S.
24 Attorney's Office and he wore a body recorder. He was
25 law partners with John D'Arco and Pat Marcy's old

1 group. He was used by the Outfit to fix cases,
2 particularly of bookmakers in local court and was
3 immersed in corruption. He walked into the U.S.
4 Attorney's Office and agreed to cooperate, and then he
5 proceeded to wear a wire.
6 Q. Is that Operation Greylord?
7 A. That wasn't Operation Greylord itself, but it
8 was along those lines. He was responsible for the
9 conviction, for instance, of the judge that freed Harry
10 Aleman. The judge -- not a conviction, but the judge
11 that committed suicide later on when he was interviewed
12 by FBI agents.
13 MR. LYDON: Excuse me.
14 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Go ahead.
15 MR. LYDON: Conviction of a judge that
16 committed suicide?
17 THE WITNESS: I misspoke. I'm sorry. He
18 identified Judge Wilson, who had accepted a bribe from
19 Cooley, to fix a case of an LCN killer named Harry
20 Aleman who was then found not guilty by Judge Wilson.
21 As a result of his information -- Cooley's information
22 Harry Aleman was retried on the murder charges even
23 though he had been previously found not guilty.
24 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: This
25 sequence -- I think the sequence is that Harry Aleman

1 was tried in state court and acquitted. And I believe
2 Judge Wilson heard that and acquitted him.
3 THE WITNESS: Yes.
4 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Later on
5 Cooley flips, becomes a cooperating individual, and
6 then testifies that he had bribed Judge Wilson to
7 acquit Aleman. And then when this became apparent,
8 Judge Wilson committed suicide. And then Aleman was
9 tried a second time and --
10 THE WITNESS: In Cook County Circuit Court.
11 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Even though
12 he had been acquitted the first time.
13 THE WITNESS: Yes, sir.
14 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: And then he
15 was then convicted.
16 I think -- the reason I know that is that was
17 testified before me one other time. I'm familiar with
18 that. Not as a prosecutor. I was around when Harry
19 Aleman was acquitted. I remember that.
20 BY MR. THOMAS:
21 Q. Did Mr. Cooley testify in either the District
22 Council case or the Bruno Caruso case?
23 A. I believe he testified in the District
24 Council case as I recall. I don't believe he testified
25 in the Bruno Caruso case.

1 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Yes, he
2 did. He testified -- I think he testified by
3 telephone, am I correct?
4 MR. THOMAS: That's my recollection.
5 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: He
6 testified by telephone. He testified in person in
7 the--
8 THE WITNESS: District Council.
9 MR. THOMAS: They may have both been by
10 telephone.
11 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: No. I
12 think they were both in person. They were both in
13 person.
14 BY MR. THOMAS:
15 Q. Mr. O'Rourke, could you speak to Mr. Cooley's
16 -- your experience concerning Mr. Cooley's reliability
17 as a witness? Has he been corroborated?
18 A. Yes, sir, he has.
19 Q. Have you ever had any doubts about the
20 information you were getting from Mr. Cooley?
21 A. No, sir.
22 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Well I take
23 it what you're telling us today that you're going to
24 relate some additional information from Mr. Cooley
25 aside from what he testified to in these proceedings?

1 THE WITNESS: Yes, sir.
2 MR. THOMAS: Yes.
3 Mr. Vaira, so there is no mystery here.
4 After I establish what this witness has to say about
5 these informants' reliability, I'm then going to go
6 down a list of names of current and former 1001 people
7 and have him testify about what information he's
8 received from these informants at any point about those
9 names.
10 MR. LYDON: Well --
11 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: And you
12 have been in recent contact with Mr. Cooley?
13 THE WITNESS: Yes, sir.
14 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: How
15 recently?
16 THE WITNESS: October.
17 BY MR. THOMAS:
18 Q. Did you say that he recently died?
19 A. Mr. Cooley?
20 Q. Yes.
21 A. No, sir, not that I know of.
22 Q. Is it Mr. Bills who died?
23 A. Mr. Bills.
24 Q. We haven't come to him yet. Thank you.
25 All right. The next name I want to ask you

1 about is Guy Bills.
2 A. Yes, sir.
3 Q. Recently deceased?
4 A. Yes, about two years ago, maybe three.
5 Q. Did Mr. Bills testify in the District Council
6 or Bruno Caruso matters?
7 A. He testified in the District Council case. I
8 don't recall -- I don't believe -- I think he was dead.
9 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: He was dead
10 when the Bruno Caruso proceeding was going on.
11 BY MR. THOMAS:
12 Q. What can you tell us about Mr. Bills'
13 background and his reliability?
14 A. Mr. Bills was part of the 26th Street
15 Chinatown Crew and was an associate of the Carusos,
16 Frank Caruso and Bruno Caruso and the Roti's, and he
17 was involved in organized crime activities, chop shops.
18 He was an enforcer and collector. He was originally
19 convinced to cooperate by myself and another Special
20 Agent, Bob Peccoraro, was debriefed at great length,
21 and then he testified in federal cases and eventually
22 went into the Witness Security Program -- went to
23 prison in the Witness Security Program. When he had --
24 when he got out I re-contacted him and began to debrief
25 him again on personalities within organized crime.

1 Q. And with respect to all of these people that
2 we're reviewing, did you also debrief them concerning
3 labor racketeering matters?
4 A. Yes.
5 Q. And what were your conclusions, if any,
6 concerning Mr. Bills' -- the reliability of Mr. Bills'
7 information?
8 A. Mr. Bills was a reliable source. He had
9 developed information while working with the FBI
10 resulting in the convictions of a number of
11 individuals. And the information that he provided was
12 corroborated by other informants.
13 Q. All right. Now I'm going to turn to the
14 people that you've indicated have been unwilling to
15 have their name used publicly. Have you given these
16 informants numbers for identification purposes?
17 A. Yes, sir.
18 Q. And have you done that in the previous
19 proceedings both in the District Council and the Caruso
20 case?
21 A. Yes.
22 MR. THOMAS: There are four numbers, Mr.
23 Lydon, that we're going to talk about here. Shorthand
24 version is 2, 5, 12 and 17.
25 BY MR. THOMAS:

1 Q. And just so we don't get confused, Mr.
2 O'Rourke, I understand that 2 is actually short for
3 1002; is that right?
4 A. Yes, sir.
5 Q. And 5 is short for 1005?
6 A. Correct.
7 Q. 12 is 1012, and 17 is 1017?
8 A. Yes, sir.
9 Q. So for purposes of our questioning we'll
10 refer to 2, 5, 12 and 17.
11 What can you tell us, Mr. O'Rourke, about
12 Informant Number 2?
13 A. Informant Number 2 was a FBI informant
14 originally developed by Special Agent Ray Stratton back
15 in the 1960's, '68. He was an informant on and off for
16 the FBI all of those years. I began debriefing him in
17 about 1991 to the present time. He over those years
18 has provided information which was found to be accurate
19 through investigation and has resulted in arrests,
20 convictions, search warrants, and so on.
21 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: You might
22 have to particularize that. When you say he was
23 qualified by the FBI, he was actually accepted and
24 qualified?
25 THE WITNESS: Yes, sir, he was.

1 MR. LYDON: I'm sorry?
2 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: I said he
3 was actually accepted by the FBI and qualified, put in
4 there -- this wasn't a hip pocket informant.
5 THE WITNESS: That's correct, sir.
6 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Tell me
7 about his reliability. What did he do for a living?
8 THE WITNESS: In his earlier days he was a
9 criminal and a member of organized crime. He was
10 associated with the Grand Avenue Crew. He was involved
11 in burglaries, jewelry robberies, and was personally
12 associated with and dealt with well known Chicago
13 organized crime figures such as Joe Lombardo, Jr. --
14 Joe Lombardo, Joseph Andriacchi, the current boss of the
15 Mob, Joseph Ferriola, the boss of the Cicero Crew, now
16 also deceased, Rocky Infelise, more recently Michael
17 Spano, who was the lieutenant in charge of the Cicero
18 crew convicted along with Betty Maltese and the recent
19 case in Federal Court, and other organized crime
20 members. And that's confirmed through investigation
21 and through surveillance. We've actually put him with
22 these individuals.
23 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: What did he
24 do with them?
25 THE WITNESS: He, primarily in his later

1 years, is trusted by them and they converse and they
2 talk business and what's going on and so on. He's not
3 -- no longer involved directly in organized crime
4 related criminal matters.
5 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Does he
6 have legitimate employment?
7 THE WITNESS: Yes, he does.
8 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Just give
9 me a field.
10 THE WITNESS: He's in construction and
11 building.
12 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Contractor?
13 THE WITNESS: Yes.
14 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Okay. All
15 right. Now you say he gave you -- give me some
16 examples of why you say he's reliable. What has he
17 demonstrated, has he done? Give me some time periods.
18 THE WITNESS: He's provided information, for
19 instance, on who the current bosses of the Organized
20 Crime Syndicate are in Chicago, confirmed through later
21 arrests, convictions or other informant information.
22 Intelligence information. He provided information on
23 the scheme to defraud the city of Cicero which involved
24 the President, Betty Maltese, and Michael Spano and
25 James Inendino (Phonetic) and others in detail which

1 proved then to be true and resulted in the indictments
2 and convictions by the FBI and --
3 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: How does
4 that occur, resulted in -- what --
5 THE WITNESS: They were indicted.
6 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: But he's
7 giving somebody information that later on something
8 occurs and someone's indicted. How did it get from one
9 place to the other? What did they do with this
10 information?
11 THE WITNESS: He provided it to the FBI at
12 that time and it was confirmed through investigation by
13 the FBI.
14 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Did the FBI
15 get any warrants, any --
16 THE WITNESS: Yes, sir. There were several
17 people indicted and then convicted in Federal Court.
18 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Did this
19 individual provide any information for a search
20 warrant?
21 THE WITNESS: No. In that case he provided
22 the information about the scheme, the ongoing scheme.
23 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: General
24 intelligence.
25 THE WITNESS: Yes, sir.

1 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Okay. Go
2 ahead.
3 MR. THOMAS: And Mr. Vaira, I certainly don't
4 want to cut off any questioning you want to do with Mr.
5 O'Rourke on this.
6 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: No, no.
7 You're about reliability, and there's certain tests for
8 reliability. Okay.
9 MR. THOMAS: Just so we're clear though. I
10 believe all but one of these informants, maybe all, but
11 I believe all but one have been previously described in
12 testimony and then written up in your opinions. Happy
13 to repeat it here if that helps.
14 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: We'll hear
15 them again.
16 MR. THOMAS: All right.
17 BY MR. THOMAS:
18 Q. All right. Anything else concerning Number 2
19 in his reliability, Mr. O'Rourke?
20 A. On one occasion, recalling back fairly
21 recently, he provided information about a tractor
22 trailer load of stolen goods which I relayed to the
23 FBI, and they conducted a surveillance and arrested --
24 recovered the stolen load and arrested several subjects
25 based entirely on his information.

1 Q. So you felt that information was
2 corroborated?
3 A. Yes, I did.
4 Q. Do you have any doubts about the information
5 you got from Informant Number 2?
6 A. No, I don't. And it's usually -- but it's
7 been corroborated by other independent informants
8 through independent investigation.
9 Q. And again just to be clear, what is the
10 nature of Mr. -- Number 2's life that makes him
11 unwilling to represent to you that you can use his name
12 in public?
13 A. He deals with -- as a former member or an
14 associate member of organized crime himself, he deals
15 on a daily business with members of organized crime and
16 with individuals in the labor movement, and they talk
17 openly in front of him. He then reports it.
18 By nature I should point out that by nature a
19 lot of the information from organized crime informants
20 is necessarily intelligence information because it's
21 by nature a secret criminal society, and it's a
22 conspiracy. And so it's unlike a normal criminal case
23 like a theft from interstate shipment case or
24 something. The Bureau, and to come extent we rely on
25 intelligence type information necessarily.

1 Q. Background data --
2 A. Yes, sir.
3 Q. -- that's used as leads for other matters.
4 A. That's correct.
5 Q. When is the last time you debriefed Informant
6 Number 2?
7 A. Just this past week.
8 Q. Let's move on to Informant Number 5. What
9 can you tell us about his background and reliability?
10 A. He's -- Number 5 has been a member of
11 organized crime for approximately thirty years. He
12 served time in prison and he was part of the Cicero
13 Crew, reporting to former Cicero Crew Boss Joe
14 Ferriola, now deceased, later Rocky Infelise. He was
15 known to associate with the enforcement group
16 consisting of a number of individuals, one of whom was
17 James "Duke," "Dukey" Basile. He was a cooperating
18 subject and wore a wire, and he was identified on the
19 wire as talking to Basile discussing activities. And
20 they engaged in shakedowns and collection of money and
21 threats to individuals and so on. He continues to be a
22 trusted individual and meets with organized crime
23 figures on a regular basis. His father was a Chicago
24 LCN associate and worked for the Department of Streets
25 and Sanitation, as did he periodically. And so he has

1 direct information over a period of thirty years with
2 individuals who, like him, are members of organized
3 crime or associates.
4 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Is he a
5 "made member"?
6 THE WITNESS: No, he's not.
7 BY MR. THOMAS:
8 Q. Could you describe how either law enforcement
9 or inspectors of LIUNA have determined him to be a
10 reliable source?
11 A. Yes, sir. I began debriefing Number 5 in
12 approximately 1987. And during that time frame he
13 provided information which was used in Title III
14 Affidavits, information that was utilized in search
15 warrants, successful search warrants, resulting in the
16 arrest of individuals or recovery of stolen property
17 and drugs, and in intelligence information regarding
18 organized crime figures, who was meeting who and where
19 they hung out and so on and so forth.
20 Q. Thank you.
21 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: What's --
22 the search warrants or arrest warrants that resulted,
23 what were the names of the individuals?
24 THE WITNESS: He provided information which
25 assisted in the arrest of the Rocky Infelise Crew. And

1 I think there was 14 or 15 individuals arrested and
2 then later convicted in Federal Court in that case
3 alone. Provided information in recovery of stolen
4 property, theft from interstate shipment cases,
5 burglaries committed by organized crime figures.
6 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: All right.
7 BY MR. THOMAS:
8 Q. Have you -- has there been any doubt in your
9 mind over the years that the information you've been
10 getting from Informant Number 5 has been accurate and
11 reliable?
12 A. No, sir.
13 Q. Moving on to Number 12, what can you tell us
14 about his background?
15 A. Number 12 was a member of organized crime.
16 He was in the Elmwood Park crew.
17 Q. "Made member" or an associate?
18 A. He was an associate. And he participated in
19 illegal activities with organized crime, collecting
20 involving vending machines and collecting from gamblers
21 who were delinquent. He provides intelligence
22 information on organized crime on a regular basis and
23 meets with individuals, talks with individuals who are
24 members of organized crime and who believe that they
25 can talk openly in front of this person.

1 Q. Can you address his reliability as an
2 informant?
3 A. The information he provides is corroborated
4 by either investigation or through other informants,
5 but I began talking with him after I left the FBI, and
6 so there are necessarily no search warrants or other
7 actual documentation that he's provided.
8 Q. So this is a post FBI informant, perhaps
9 better put a LIUNA only informant, right?
10 A. Yes, sir.
11 Q. And you indicated that you've tested his
12 reliability through corroboration of other -- through
13 debriefings of other informants.
14 A. Yes, sir.
15 Q. Obviously without getting information out
16 that would identify this person, can you give us some
17 -- a sense of how you do that? What types of
18 information do you cross check to see that it's
19 reliable?
20 A. If he says that he's met with Mr. X, who we
21 know to be a member of organized crime and has done
22 certain things, and then I asked other informants, "Do
23 you know Mr. X or have you ever heard of this person,"
24 and they all indicate that person's a member of
25 organized crime. He meets with X, Y and Z. He does

1 this and it all corroborates each other.
2 MR. LYDON: I object. This is getting me
3 totally confused because I think we've got X, Y and Z,
4 and I don't know who we're talking about. When you
5 said X the first time around, you referred to X as a
6 member of organized crime. Now I get the impression
7 that X is somebody else. It's a confusing answer.
8 MR. THOMAS: I think he's simply making the
9 point that -- the question specifically was: "How do
10 you cross check those." He's simply saying,
11 "When I debrief another witness and I run the
12 information by another witness, and I get the same
13 information from another witness."
14 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Let's hear
15 it from him. Without using X and Y --
16 THE WITNESS: Yes, sir.
17 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: You get Mr.
18 Lydon's question? How do you debrief -- this is a new
19 informant, didn't come from the FBI. You developed him
20 yourself.
21 THE WITNESS: No, sir. He did come from the
22 FBI actually, and I was allowed to speak with him and
23 continued speaking with him. He originally had been
24 cooperating with the FBI, and so still periodically
25 does, and was considered reliable by the FBI. He

1 provides information based on his experience as a
2 member of organized crime. And he knows individuals
3 who are members or who are associate members and what
4 they do and how they do it, and the information that
5 he's provided is corroborated on debriefing these other
6 informants or these other cooperating individuals.
7 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: This
8 individual -- informants have many, many reasons for
9 giving information. Sometimes it's called fire
10 insurance too. They get in trouble and then they go
11 back to the FBI and they think they can get out of it,
12 and there's times the sentence may be moderated or
13 something. What's in this for him now that he's no
14 longer cooperating with the FBI? What's in it now for
15 him to cooperate?
16 THE WITNESS: Actually, Mr. Vaira, nothing is
17 in it for him. It's pretty much based on the personal
18 relationship and trust with the debriefer, namely
19 myself, and he provides the information for that
20 reason.
21 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: What's he
22 doing for a living?
23 THE WITNESS: He has a regular job. I don't
24 want to --
25 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: I

1 understand. A legitimate job?
2 THE WITNESS: Yes, sir, he has a legitimate
3 job.
4 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: He's self
5 employed?
6 THE WITNESS: Self employed, regular
7 position, you know, and he is able then to -- is able
8 to meet with and talk with other individuals who are
9 members of organized crime.
10 BY MR. THOMAS:
11 Q. If I could just interject one question here,
12 Mr. O'Rourke. When you say that this is not -- you
13 initially said this is a LIUNA only informant. I take
14 it that's from your own experience, correct?
15 A. Yes, sir.
16 Q. In other words, but the informant came to you
17 from -- via the FBI?
18 A. Correct. Right.
19 Q. In other words, he first was a Bureau
20 informant after you had left the Bureau.
21 A. That's correct.
22 Q. And then they put you in touch with him or
23 vice versa?
24 A. I debriefed him while I was in the Bureau,
25 actually, on one occasion. So I knew him and he knew

1 me from that one occasion, but I was not the case agent
2 on him and I did not debrief on a regular basis until
3 after I started with LIUNA.
4 Q. Thank you. Have you ever doubted the quality
5 or accuracy of the information you've been getting from
6 informant Number 12?
7 A. No, sir.
8 Q. Moving on to Number 17. What can you tell us
9 about Number 17?
10 A. Number 17 is an individual who is
11 knowledgeable about organized crime. He was an LCN
12 associate. He's personally related to some organized
13 crime figures. He has personally been associated with
14 such figures as Joseph Lombardo, Michael Switek --
15 Q. Lombardo Senior or Junior?
16 A. Senior and Junior both. And members of the
17 North Side Crew primarily. He worked for the City of
18 Chicago. And he served time in prison with organized
19 crime figures and is extremely knowledgeable and meets
20 and talks with them on a regular basis.
21 Q. Have you been able to assess his reliability
22 as an informant?
23 A. Yes, sir.
24 Q. And what conclusions, if any, have you drawn
25 about that?

1 A. The information he's provided has been
2 accurate and reliable.
3 Q. So in connection with the names I'm about to
4 review with you, there are three informants named and
5 then four additional unnamed informants, all of whom
6 you feel have provided you with reliable information.
7 A. Yes, sir.
8 Q. And can you describe for the Hearing Officer
9 and for the others in the room, any efforts on your
10 part to make sure that the information you were getting
11 from these people was current for purposes of this
12 hearing.
13 A. I debriefed them probably within the last --
14 mostly in October, some in November, updated the
15 information. A lot of the information has been
16 provided all along as I debriefed them on a regular
17 basis. But I went back and ran the names by them, some
18 of the other names by them, and of course the list of
19 the individuals that were on this document supplied to
20 me.
21 Q. Just to be clear what you're referring to
22 there. At my request did you also have the list of 33
23 recipients, 1001 members who received Pension and
24 Welfare contributions, and run those names by these
25 informants as well?

1 A. Yes, sir, I did.
2 Q. So in prior conversations you may not have
3 listed all 33 of those.
4 A. That's correct.
5 Q. Okay. Thank you.
6 Let's start first with the current officer
7 at Local 1001. The business manager is Nicholas
8 Gironda; is that correct?
9 A. Yes, sir.
10 Q. Have you had occasion in the past and
11 recently as well to ask these informants about Nick
12 Gironda?
13 A. Yes, sir.
14 MR. LYDON: By way of background, are you
15 going to say which of them you spoke to?
16 MR. THOMAS: Yes, he will.
17 BY MR. THOMAS:
18 Q. Which of the seven informants, Mr. O'Rourke,
19 had anything of significance to say about Mr. Gironda?
20 Let's just list them and then we'll go through them.
21 A. 2, 5, 12, and Guy Bills and Joe Granata and
22 Bob Cooley.
23 Q. So all but 17?
24 A. That's correct.
25 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Exclude Guy

1 Bills.
2 MR. THOMAS: I'm sorry, Mr. Vaira?
3 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Exclude Guy
4 Bills.
5 MR. THOMAS: For all of the testimony?
6 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: On this
7 one. If you can give me something, just leave Guy
8 Bills out separately.
9 BY MR. THOMAS:
10 Q. So what if anything, Mr. O'Rourke, have you
11 learned through your debriefings of these, let's call
12 them five, excluding Mr. Bills, 2, 5, 12, Granata and
13 Cooley, what have you learned about Mr. Gironda?
14 A. In summary, the informants and the
15 cooperating witnesses indicated Gironda was related to
16 Bruno Caruso and to the Rotis from the 26th Street
17 Chinatown. And after he got into trouble with the City
18 of Chicago he was brought into the Union and began to
19 be paid by the Union. That he was Bruno Caruso's
20 relative, cousin I believe, and is -- was known to them
21 as a Chicago LCN associate affiliated with the 26th
22 Street Chinatown Crew.
23 Q. All of them said words to that effect?
24 A. Yes, sir.
25 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: What's the

1 trouble with the City you're referring to? You're
2 referring to something with the City, Nick Gironda had
3 some trouble with the City.
4 THE WITNESS: I can't recall the details, but
5 he was in some kind of an investigation by the
6 Inspector General, and he was in an unpaid position
7 with the Union, and then he was -- on orders of Bruno
8 Caruso he began to be paid a salary.
9 MR. LYDON: And I object and move to strike
10 all that's said -- all he said he was associated with
11 the 26th Street Crew. That kind of information is just
12 too indefinite to mean anything. I don't know what it
13 means.
14 MR. THOMAS: That's an objection that goes to
15 the weight, not to the relevance or the admissibility.
16 If what Mr. Lydon is saying is that the only thing is
17 relevant is if Mr. O'Rourke has personally witnessed
18 Mr. Gironda taking a bag of cash, we're not going to
19 present that evidence. We don't have that evidence.
20 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: I don't
21 think he's saying that. His objection is I guess in
22 the weight of substance, some particularity as to what
23 that means. Associated can mean associated. It also
24 can mean very associated, it could mean in passing.
25 And I think his objection -- I'll accept it, but, you

1 know, giving it the weight, as I have to do in all
2 these, I really have to go through these with a fine
3 tooth comb. And I understand he's associated with the
4 26th Street Crew --
5 MR. LYDON: It's just too vague --
6 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: I think you
7 -- he has to explain a little more.
8 BY MR. THOMAS:
9 Q. Mr. O'Rourke, is there -- I suppose if you
10 have to break these down conversation by conversation
11 to the extent that you can, maybe that's the way to go.
12 But are you able to, to the extent possible, put in
13 their words the information that you gleaned concerning
14 Mr. Gironda.
15 By way of background let me say with respect
16 to all these informants you went through a list of some
17 30 plus names, right?
18 A. Yes, sir.
19 Q. And you've got a paragraph or two on each one
20 if they knew something about that person.
21 A. Yes, sir.
22 Q. So in that context, you know, what did these
23 people say about Nick Gironda?
24 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: What did he
25 do? They're all probably saying -- you're saying he's

1 connected in some fashion.
2 THE WITNESS: That's correct.
3 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Tell us
4 what that means. What does he do to be connected?
5 THE WITNESS: All of the informants said that
6 they knew from personal experience and from
7 conversations with other members of organized crime
8 that Nick Gironda was an organized crime associate and
9 was beholden or involved with the 26th Street Crew,
10 which was run by Frank Caruso, and previously to him
11 "Skids" Caruso, and he was a relative of the Carusos.
12 And further they all indicated that he replaced Bruno
13 Caruso because he was a member of the 26th Street Crew,
14 and as a way of continuing the influence of that group.
15 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: When you
16 say "replaced Bruno Caruso," what do you mean by that?
17 THE WITNESS: As Business Manager.
18 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Mr.
19 Caruso--
20 THE WITNESS: Bruno Caruso was part of the --
21 involved in the Union.
22 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Two years
23 ago?
24 MR. THOMAS: I think -- well your opinion
25 came down --

1 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: It was
2 about two years ago. What was Nick Gironda before he
3 became the Business Manager?
4 MR. THOMAS: I believe Secretary-Treasurer,
5 but I'll check.
6 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Okay. He
7 was an officer. Okay.
8 THE WITNESS: He was an officer.
9 MR. THOMAS: He was Secretary-Treasurer.
10 And then when Mr. Caruso was expelled from the Union,
11 which, by the way, was by your opinion of January 10,
12 2001, which is then affirmed September 13th, 2001. And
13 in 2001 Mr. Gironda became Business Manager.
14 BY MR. THOMAS:
15 Q. So Mr. O'Rourke, what did your informants say
16 with respect to Mr. Gironda's accession to the Business
17 Manager position.
18 A. Their information was based on talk among
19 organized crime members, and they indicated that that
20 was to be expected and the word -- the word on the
21 street was because he was a relative of the Carusos and
22 a member of the 26th Street Chinatown Crew, then he
23 ascended to that job to continue the influence of the
24 26th Street and organized crime in the Union.
25 Q. One second.

1 Now Mr. O'Rourke, in the -- this has
2 previously been covered in some of the other cases, but
3 if you turn to Exhibit Number 2 in your book, on page
4 245 of the District Council opinion --
5 MR. LYDON: Could we have a moment?
6 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: What are we
7 looking at, gentlemen?
8 MR. THOMAS: Page 245 of Exhibit 2.
9 BY MR. THOMAS:
10 Q. Specifically the background is paragraph 61,
11 but specifically paragraph number 62. Do you recall,
12 Mr. O'Rourke, that there was a time when you and your
13 colleagues served the District Council Trusteeship
14 papers on Mr. Bruno Caruso.
15 A. Yes, sir.
16 Q. And in connection with that service of
17 papers, had existing law enforcement officials been
18 notified that this was going to happen for purposes of
19 surveillance?
20 A. Yes, sir.
21 Q. And as set forth in paragraph number 62, what
22 did Mr. Caruso and anyone else do once he was given
23 those papers?
24 A. Bruno Caruso was accompanied by Nicholas
25 Gironda.

1 Q. Who at the time was the Secretary-Treasurer
2 of 1001?
3 A. Yes, sir.
4 Q. And a Delegate to the District Council?
5 A. They had been attending a golf outing at the
6 Old Oak Country Club in Orland Park. We approached and
7 served him with the papers and then left, and
8 surveillance had been instituted. Gironda and Caruso
9 together then proceeded first to a trucking company run
10 by a Caruso relative named Bruno Barbara, Barbara
11 Trucking Company, and then from there proceeded to the
12 residence of his uncle, Alderman Roti.
13 Q. So there are two that's there, Mr. Caruso and
14 Mr. Gironda, that you described them being involved in,
15 first starting at Barbara Trucking?
16 A. Yes, sir.
17 Q. And second with Alderman Roti?
18 A. Yes.
19 Q. And the Roti visit is described in paragraph
20 62?
21 A. Yes, sir, that's correct.
22 Q. In your expert opinion, Mr. O'Rourke, what
23 are the organized crime implications of Mr. Caruso and
24 Mr. Gironda visiting first Barbara Trucking and then
25 second Alderman Roti after being served these papers.

1 MR. LYDON: Object to the speculation.
2 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Any other
3 question?
4 MR. THOMAS: The question was: "What in your
5 expert opinion is the organized crime significance of
6 the -- both District Council and 1001 officers --
7 excuse me. Bruno Caruso was the Business Manager of
8 the District Council. Nick Gironda was a Delegate to
9 the District Council. Caruso was the Business Manager
10 at the time of 1001 and Gironda was Secretary-Treasurer
11 of 1001. The question to the witness was: "What's
12 the, in your opinion, is the organized crime
13 significance, if any, to their visiting first, Barbara
14 Trucking, and second, Alderman Roti in connection with
15 receiving these papers." And the relevance of this has
16 already been established in your prior --
17 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: I'll
18 overrule the objection. Just let me hear it. I'm not
19 so sure where we're going with this. Go ahead.
20 THE WITNESS: The primary significance of
21 both -- the visit to Barbara Trucking is -- I don't
22 know the significance of that. But Barbara was
23 arrested with Frank Caruso and "Shorty" LaMantia in
24 1980 and is also a relative of Carusos, and he's a
25 member -- he's a Chicago LCN associate.

1 BY MR. THOMAS:
2 Q. Who are you talking about?
3 A. Bruno Barbara, B-a-r-b-a-r-a.
4 The visit to Alderman Roti, which is Bruno
5 Caruso's uncle, as I recall, Fred Roti, who is now
6 deceased, was the Alderman for the 1st Ward and was
7 involved, according to the investigation by the FBI,
8 with the corruption and influencing of the City in
9 Streets and Sanitation through the 1st Ward
10 Organization which was proved by or at least indicated
11 by cooperating witness Cooley and through investigation
12 and wire taps.
13 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: I believe
14 that the -- the facts will speak for themselves. We
15 don't need his speculation as to what they mean if the
16 -- Alderman Roti is -- what Alderman Roti was. I can
17 glean something or not glean something from that. So
18 I'll take that --
19 MR. THOMAS: And if I could just --
20 THE WITNESS: I'll overrule the objection.
21 MR. THOMAS: If I can refer you, Mr. Vaira,
22 to specific of those paragraphs and the underlying
23 testimony of course in the District Council case --
24 this also comes up in the Bruno Caruso disciplinary
25 case. I just want to give you the cites for that.

1 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: I'm
2 familiar with both those opinions that Bruno Caruso
3 went to see Alderman Roti after being served with the
4 subpoena -- the complaint.
5 BY MR. THOMAS:
6 Q. Mr. O'Rourke, could you just help us identify
7 the passage in Exhibit 4, where this is also discussed,
8 and let me direct your attention to page 53, paragraph
9 93 of Exhibit 4. Do you see that, Mr. O'Rourke?
10 A. Yes, sir, right.
11 Q. So did this matter come up also in the Bruno
12 Caruso hearing specifically?
13 A. Yes, it did.
14 MR. THOMAS: And the findings that flow from
15 that, Mr. Vaira, were that you rejected Mr. Caruso's
16 proffer that this had been a visit to his mother and
17 not to Mr. Roti.
18 BY MR. THOMAS:
19 Q. All right. The visit to Roti's residence,
20 was that a short visit or an extended visit?
21 A. Thirty minutes.
22 Q. And from your perspective -- and I apologize
23 if you've already answered this question. Knowing what
24 you do about organized crime in Chicago, what
25 inferences, if any, would you have drawn from the fact

1 that Mr. Caruso and Mr. Gironda went immediately to Mr.
2 Roti's house after being served these papers?
3 MR. LYDON: Objection.
4 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Let me make
5 a statement here. I'm trying to draw a fine line here.
6 Mr. O'Rourke is testifying as an expert and he's also
7 testifying as somewhat of an occurrence witness. And
8 his testimony as an expert generally is an area based
9 upon what you know is Mr. Gironda quote, "connected" or
10 -- the fact that certain incidents occur such as
11 visiting Alderman Roti's place and giving the
12 significance of it, I mean it borders on expertise. I
13 don't think we need to hear an expert opinion on that
14 because I know what it means. You can use that as
15 argument. If we're using him as an expert, let's use
16 him as an expert rather than this. And the fact that
17 he goes down and he spends thirty minutes in there, we
18 don't need -- a layman can give you an expert opinion
19 on that what you -- okay? So let's keep Mr. O'Rourke
20 in his area of being an expert rather than an area that
21 he talked about unless it's something very peculiar.
22 All right.
23 MR. MENDENHALL: Can we take a five minute
24 break?
25 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Sure.

1 (Whereupon a lunch break was taken
2 in the proceedings after which
3 the following proceedings were
4 had:)
5 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Okay,
6 ladies and gentlemen, we're going to go back on the
7 record here. Madam Reporter, you ready to go?
8 THE COURT REPORTER: Yes, sir.
9 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Gentlemen,
10 you should be ready to go. Back on the record.
11 MR. THOMAS: Mr. Vaira, a couple of
12 procedural things.
13 First I've talked to Mr. Lydon about this and
14 he is agreeable. Mr. Jorgensen is available, and I
15 think we could -- if we took a break on Mr. O'Rourke's
16 testimony, we could probably finish his direct and
17 cross today. Just as a courtesy to him I would like to
18 do that since he's come all the way in town for his
19 testimony.
20 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: On
21 Jorgensen you will finish his direct and cross.
22 MR. THOMAS: Yes.
23 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: That's
24 fine. It's your gig, gentlemen. And we will --
25 MR. THOMAS: And then we will resume Mr.

1 O'Rourke's whenever he's available.
2 MR. FARACI: Mr. Thomas has indicated he
3 believes the testimony of Mr. Jorgensen is going to be
4 about an hour and a half to two hours, so I can't
5 guarantee that we will be able to finish our cross
6 today. However, I think Mr. Jorgensen is available
7 also on some other dates, or if we can bring him back
8 tomorrow to finish the cross, we can do it then.
9 MR. THOMAS: I certainly didn't intend to
10 preclude anything there.
11 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: No. Just
12 as to where we're going. Gentlemen, coming in I ran
13 into Mr. Jorgensen -- the attorney for the Funds and
14 he's holding a subpoena, a copy of which you gave to
15 me. And is there -- what do you need me to do with
16 these subpoenas?
17 MR. FARACI: What we would like to do is Mr.
18 Jorgensen indicated there's quite a few volumes. What
19 I would like them to do is for you to order them to
20 produce these documents for our inspection. In
21 particular --
22 THE INDEPENDENT HEARING OFFICER: Let me do
23 this: First, the law is unclear. I mean our own law,
24 our own laws are somewhat unclear as to these
25 subpoenas, but if I sign them they'll go. That's what

1 I understand.
2 MR. THOMAS: I would assume so. I guess the
3 -- I view these two requests quite distinctly to the
4 extent that the subpoena for testimony talks about
5 bringing LIUNA members before you. It seems to me that
6 he has the right to ask for that and, you know,
7 assuming there is some relevance to it, that tha