Teamsters Named in Airport Rackets Suit

The federal government, charging that organized crime has virtual control over air-freight operations at John F. Kennedy International Airport, filed a civil racketeering suit Wednesday aimed at ousting the leadership of two Teamsters Union locals.

“This is a problem that has been festering for years and years,” U.S. Atty. Andrew J. Maloney said in announcing the suit. “For decades, the locals have been able to control and victimize the air-cargo at Kennedy Airport,” where more than half of all international air freight enters the country.

The complaint filed in federal district court alleges a variety of extortion schemes by mob-connected officials of Teamster Local 295 in Queens and Local 851 in Nassau County, Long Island. The government estimates that roughly 10 freight handling firms have suffered damages of more than $10 million since 1978, with one company being forced to pay $6,000 a week over a two-year period to fend off work-stoppage threats.

All but two or three of the victims named in the suit were driven out of business, Maloney said, and “larger legitimate companies have decided not to go into business at J.F.K.”

In some cases, the government claims, union leaders sold away the rights of their members--allowing firms to remain non-union in return for cash payments.

As part of a settlement last year of a larger racketeering suit against the Teamsters nationally, the 1.6-million member union is being overseen by a three-member independent review board charged with settling its corruption problems. Charles M. Carberry, the court-appointed investigator of the national union, is going down a “parallel road” in relation to the two union locals, Maloney said.

The suit, which names the boards of the two Teamster locals and 14 individuals, seeks to collect damages, and to have a trustee appointed to oversee operation of the locals. The government claims that union officials are connected with the Gambino and Lucchese organized crime families.

Officials of the two locals were not available for comment. Employees answering the telephone at both offices said they were unaware of the suit.

James M. Fox, assistant director in charge of the FBI’s New York office, said air-freight firms are particularly vulnerable to pressure because their business hinges on speed, and they cannot afford the delays of strikes and slowdowns.

The lawsuit is another effort by the government to use the far-reaching Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations act, known as RICO, in areas where it believes that criminal prosecution has failed to break the grip of organized crime. Last month, for example, the Justice Department filed a similar suit against top officers of the International Longshoremen’s Assn., alleging that they held illegal control of the New York and New Jersey waterfront.

Although prosecutors may put individual leaders in jail with criminal actions, they complain that these people often continue to control corrupt unions through their lieutenants. Civil suits seek to sever their connections altogether.

Because it is a civil action, this RICO suit does not allow the government to seek jail terms or other criminal penalties. However, civil suits may make it easier to obtain a guilty verdict because they impose a lower standard of proof and allow the use of previous convictions as evidence.