Ex-Teamster Chief Ordered to Jail Hospital

Former Teamsters President Roy L. Williams today was ordered to enter a prison hospital to begin a 10-year sentence for conspiring to bribe a U.S. senator.

The order came from U.S. District Judge Prentice Marshall, who reduced Williams’ original 55-year sentence.

After an emotional appeal for leniency by Williams, Marshall ordered the former union leader to report to the prison hospital at Springfield, Mo., in 60 days.

“My life is in your hands,” Williams, 70, told the judge. He also said he was innocent.

Williams suffers from severe emphysema and heart problems, and was wheeled into the courtroom tethered to an oxygen supply.

Marshall did not comment on the reduced sentence. The original 55-year sentence was provisional pending a medical evaluation.

The sentence was imposed in 1983, but the medical evaluation did not take place until this year because Williams’ case was appealed to the Supreme Court.

Marshall said 60 days should give Williams time to seek medical attention and get his personal affairs in order.

Williams was convicted with four other people in 1982 for conspiring to bribe then-U.S. Sen. Howard Cannon (D-Nev.) with a lucrative Las Vegas land deal in exchange for his help in defeating trucking deregulation legislation.

The legislation passed; Cannon was never accused of wrongdoing.