John C. Cheasty, 96; Witness in 1957 Bribery Case Against Hoffa

John C. Cheasty, 96, a star witness in the U.S. government’s 1957 bribery case against Teamsters Union President Jimmy Hoffa, died June 14 of congestive heart failure in Bahama, N.C.

A former Secret Service agent and Navy intelligence officer during World War II, Cheasty was recruited by Hoffa to spy on a Senate committee investigating labor racketeering in the 1950s. Cheasty met with Hoffa in Detroit, was given a $2,000 a month retainer, and then arranged to join the staff of the Senate committee, whose chief counsel was Robert F. Kennedy.

Cheasty agreed to pass fake documents to Hoffa while Kennedy built a bribery case against the Teamsters leader. Despite impressive evidence against Hoffa, including Cheasty’s testimony and undercover film showing Hoffa accepting a packet of committee documents, jurors voted for acquittal, saying they didn’t believe Cheasty.

FBI agents guarded Cheasty and his family for more than a year after the trial, and there were reports that Hoffa had put out a contract on Cheasty’s life.

Born in New York City to Irish immigrants, Cheasty graduated from Manhattan College and Fordham University Law School. He worked as a lawyer in Washington and New York City after World War II. He retired in 1994 at age 87.

According to an obituary in the New York Times on Monday, Cheasty told his family that he had been a contract employee of the Central Intelligence Agency in the 1960s and ‘70s.