Sodexo USA Files RICO Lawsuit Against SEIU

[MamaMia]

Posted on: Thursday, 17 March 2011, 17:54 CDT

Services Leader Seeks to End SEIU's Campaign of Extortion

GAITHERSBURG, Md., March 17, 2011 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ - Sodexo USA today filed a civil lawsuit against the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) and other defendants under the Racketeering Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act, to stop the illegal campaign of extortion that the SEIU has been waging in the U.S. for over a year.


"This is about protecting the Company's business and the rights of our employees to vote freely about union representation," said Robert Stern, Senior Vice President and General Counsel for Sodexo USA. "We work constructively with unions every day but the SEIU has crossed the line by breaking the law. We will not tolerate the SEIU's tactics any longer. Their campaign jeopardizes our Company and our employees' jobs, and ultimately would rob our employees of their right to vote."

Sodexo USA has filed the lawsuit seeking to halt the SEIU's extortionate threats and barrage of unlawful tactics. The complaint alleges acts of SEIU blackmail, vandalism, trespass, harassment, and lobbying law violations designed to steer business away from Sodexo USA and harm the company.

Sodexo USA recognizes the value of union activity and has built positive relationships with more than 30 different unions. Over 15 percent of Sodexo USA's workforce is unionized, which is more than twice the national average for the private sector, and the Company has more than 300 collective bargaining agreements. Despite this positive record, the SEIU has engaged in a vicious campaign to force the Company into broadly recognizing the SEIU to the exclusion of other unions without allowing its employees in the U.S. to exercise their right to vote for or against the SEIU in a federally supervised secret ballot election.

The complaint alleges that the SEIU, in face to face meetings, threatened Sodexo USA's executives that it would harm Sodexo USA's business unless they gave in to the union, and then carried out its threats through egregious behavior, including:

*throwing plastic roaches onto food being served by Sodexo USA at a high profile event;

*scaring hospital patients by insinuating that Sodexo USA food contained bugs, rat droppings, mold and flies;

*lying to interfere with Sodexo USA business and sneaking into elementary schools to avoid security;

*violating lobbying laws to steer business away from Sodexo USA, even at the risk of costing Sodexo USA employees their jobs; and harassing Sodexo USA employees by threatening to accuse them of wrongdoing.

The complaint, filed in federal court in the Eastern District of Virginia, seeks an injunction against the SEIU and its locals and executives, as well as monetary damages to be determined by the court.

Sodexo, Inc. (www.sodexoUSA.com), leading Quality of Daily Life Solutions company in the U.S., Canada, and Mexico, delivers On Site Service Solutions in Corporate, Education, Health Care, Government, and Remote Site segments, as well as Motivation Solutions such as Esteem Pass. Sodexo, Inc., headquartered in Gaithersburg, Md., funds all administrative costs for the Sodexo Foundation (www.SodexoFoundation.org), an independent charitable organization that, since its founding in 1999, has made more than $15 million in grants to fight hunger in America. Visit the corporate blog at www.sodexoUSA.com/blog.

Sodexo in North America 8.0 billion dollars revenue 120,000 employees 10 million consumers served daily 6,000 sites 700 facilities management sites

http://www.redorbit.com/news/health/2014525/sodexo_usa_files_rico_lawsuit_against_seiu/index.html

[KantoSooner]

Typical.
Unions betray their origins and those of their bosses. It's never a positive message from them. It's never about how to improve the workplace or workproduct. Nope. It's 'agree with our demands or we move to outright extortion'.
Unions have totally outlived their usefulness.

[MamaMia]

Typical.
Unions betray their origins and those of their bosses. It's never a positive message from them. It's never about how to improve the workplace or workproduct. Nope. It's 'agree with our demands or we move to outright extortion'.
Unions have totally outlived their usefulness.They're thugs

[soonercruiser]

God for Sodexo!

[TheHumanAlphabet]

Typical.
Unions betray their origins and those of their bosses. It's never a positive message from them. It's never about how to improve the workplace or workproduct. Nope. It's 'agree with our demands or we move to outright extortion'.
Unions have totally outlived their usefulness.

^^^^THIS Big Time!!!!

[Leroy Lizard]

StoopTroup, can you please post the pro union thug line? How about:

"Extortion and scare tactics are no big deal!"

[The Profit]

God for Sodexo!




Not sure that God is taking sides.

[Tulsa_Fireman]

StoopTroup, can you please post the pro union thug line? How about:

"Extortion and scare tactics are no big deal!"

I'll save him the trouble.

Fry their asses. If the complaint is held in court then I hope the powers that be drop Nagasaki on SEIU's crotch. The beauty of the article which a number of you failed to notice however is how this company has done well with union shops and employees. How they have over 300 CBAs and how business is great. Up until this goon squad gestapo bullcrap comes rolling into town via the SEIU.

Is that an indictment of unions? Maybe if you're a blind retard. It's an indictment of the SEIU. Rock on, Sodexo.

[The Profit]

I've had Sodexo food in union and non-union areas. It really sucked in both places.

[KantoSooner]

Guess I'm a blind retard, then.

Generally speaking, I regard the job interview process as a two way street. If the company's working conditions suck, I don't want the job. How is the world a better place if I seek out crap working conditions and then make them worse by engaging in a fuzzy nuts competition with the owners?

[Mongo]

Not sure that God is taking sides.


I've had Sodexo food in union and non-union areas. It really sucked in both places.

God hates fags and fish stick fridays

[MamaMia]

and in other union news... UAW is circling the wagons around Ford.

DETROIT - As the UAW prepares to head into labor talks this summer with the newly profitable Detroit automakers, several top union leaders say a showdown is brewing - especially at Ford, which has made $9.3 billion over the past two years.

"If they don't restore everything (we) gave up, the membership is going to knock it down," said Bill Johnson, plant chair for UAW Local 900, which represents workers at the Focus plant in Wayne, Mich. "The bonuses that were just announced are just ridiculous."

The accumulated pay package for Ford President and CEO Alan Mulally, who is credited with rescuing Ford after arriving in 2006, is now valued at more than $300 million.

Despite the demands, Ford, like its crosstown rivals, is expected to try to hold the line on labor costs or seek to lower them to remain competitive. To do that, Ford could make future product promises and offer ratification bonuses.

"It all comes down to competitiveness in every element of our business," said Mark Fields, Ford President of the Americas.

This week, more than 1,200 UAW delegates will meet in Detroit to plan for the upcoming talks. The current contract expires on Sept. 14.

But the clash of goals is potentially problematic. While GM and Chrysler have no-strike clauses, because they took U.S. loans, Ford does not. Ford workers haven't gone on strike since 1976, but they rejected the last contract change proposed in late 2009.

During this year's contract talks with the UAW, Detroit's automakers want to hold the line on fixed labor costs or further close the wage gap that remains with their foreign competitors operating in the U.S. - goals that aren't likely to go over well with the union's rank-and-file.

After a decade of contracts filled with concessions to save the Detroit Three - such as plant closures, the diversion of performance bonuses to cover health care costs, the loss of some holidays and the suspension of cost-of-living increases - frustrated workers are eager to regain what they've lost.

They see the automakers earning billions and executives cashing in on the profits. Last year, Ford earned $6.6 billion and General Motors earned $4.7 billion. Chrysler still lost $652 million but made an operating profit and is projected to be in the black this year.

UAW Vice President Jimmy Settles, who leads the union's Ford department, said product commitments and job security will be top priorities with Ford.

"Obviously people want their concessions back, but people have a lot of anxiety because they don't know what is going to happen to them," Settles said. "There are a lot of plants still in jeopardy."

But there are other objectives.

Many expect the union to pursue a rollback or tweak of the entry-level wage to which the UAW agreed in 2007. That so-called second-tier started new hires at $14 to $16 per hour and was hailed as a major breakthrough that would help the Detroit Three become competitive with plants operated by Asian automakers in the U.S. Between 20 percent to 30 percent of the automakers' work force was allowed to be hired at the lower tier.

Many UAW workers were against the entry-level wage structure and said it would breed dissension between new and old workers, who on average earn $28 per hour.

"I think what the UAW will try to do is try to get a pay increase for the second-tier workers," said Arthur Schwartz, former GM labor negotiator and president of Labor and Economics Associates.

Only 1,300 of GM's 49,000 hourly workers are full-time entry-level workers. Ford hasn't hired any permanent workers at the lower tier but does employ 2,100 "long-term supplemental," or temporary, workers hired at the lower wage.

Chrysler declined to say how many workers it has hired at the lower wage but it said it has added "a significant number" at two plants .

"Hiring people at the new entry-level wage makes the overall labor cost more competitive with the transplants and is the basis of the future labor cost model," Chrysler said in a statement.

[Tulsa_Fireman]

Guess I'm a blind retard, then.

Generally speaking, I regard the job interview process as a two way street. If the company's working conditions suck, I don't want the job. How is the world a better place if I seek out crap working conditions and then make them worse by engaging in a fuzzy nuts competition with the owners?

Rock on.

I like how you turned employees and employers working together (as is obviously the case throughout a large part of Sodexo) into A) an example of sh*tty working conditions and B) a fuzzy nuts competition with ownership which C) wouldn't exist if the job was worth a crap in the first place, right?

Rock on, oh thee with limited vision and mental capacity.

[Tulsa_Fireman]

and in other union news... UAW is circling the wagons around Ford.

DETROIT - [B]As the UAW prepares to be yet another example MamaMia uses to demonstrate how unions are inseminating your children with their demon wang and defiling your grandmother's grave...

Rock on, sister. Rock on.

[The Profit]

God hates fags and fish stick fridays




I can't speak for God, but I damn sure hated fish stick Fridays. I despised the Catholics for that, and I still haven't forgiven them. I can't look at a fish stick without wanting to frigging puke. Fish sticks and warm milk??? That really made sense, didn't it?

[Tulsa_Fireman]

I can't look at a fish stick without wanting to frigging puke.

http://www.gamesprays.com/images/icons/fish_sticks_icon1221.jpg

Why do you hate America?

[The Profit]

http://www.gamesprays.com/images/icons/fish_sticks_icon1221.jpg

Why do you hate America?




I am one of those strange folks, who love America, but loathe fish sticks. What can I say?

[Tulsa_Fireman]

You can say you were mistaken and you now realize your love for America hinges entirely on whether or not you like fish sticks.

You could say that.

[The Profit]

You can say you were mistaken and you now realize your love for America hinges entirely on whether or not you like fish sticks.

You could say that.





Can I still hate Catholics?

[Tulsa_Fireman]

Of course!

It's the American way.

[Half a Hundred]

I wish they would release the pleading. It'll be interesting to see how they get past Twombly and Iqbal on the RICO claim.

[MamaMia]

Rock on, sister. Rock on.
I'm on a mission from God. :P Michelle Malkin said it best in 2009...

SEIU and the “persuasion of power;” August 6, 2009

In May, I told you how the Service Employees International Union’s $61 million investment in Barack Obama paid off with cabinet appointments, executive orders, key personnel slots, and legislative goodies.

Now, the SEIU thugs are looking out for The Boss. In Tampa, Florida and St. Louis today, the Purple People turned out to give cover to members of Congress targeted by Tea Party activists and town hall protesters. For the first time, the town hall protests were marked by physical aggression. More on the St. Louis arrests of confrontational Obamacare activists here. (Just like Obama wanted: “In your face.”) This is no coincidence.

I’m excerpting a portion of my Culture of Corruption chapter on the SEIU. This is what you are up against.

“The persuasion of power”

Asked about his organizing philosophy, Andy Stern summed it up this way: “We prefer to use the power of persuasion, but if that doesn’t work we use the persuasion of power.”

Stern and his shock troops have bullied companies from private equity firms to Burger King to food management company Aramark, who have resisted SEIU’s attempts to organizer their workers. The Purple People have organized aggressive protests and a “War on Greed” campaign to pound the employers into submission. One of the besieged targets, security provider Wackenhut Services, battled SEIU’s attempts to gain exclusive representation for its employees. The company already ten other unions representing its workers. Initially unbowed by a massive, malicious negative publicity campaign against them, Wackenhut blew the whistle:

The SEIU seeks membership growth through aggressive “corporate campaigns” that have a blunt message to employers, “Let us unionize your workforce or we will destroy your reputation.” This tactic has been used against a number of organizations to include Wal-Mart, Kaiser Permanente, Advocate Health Care, Catholic Healthcare West, and Sutter Health.

SEIU is attempting to coerce The Wackenhut Corporation and WSI to recognize it as the “exclusive” collective bargaining representative throughout Wackenhut. Wackenhut declined to enter into such an agreement. The SEIU responded with a corporate campaign that is intended to damage WSI’s reputation and relationships with our clients. Their campaign tactics include distributing misinformation, distortion and omission of fact through the media, conducting demonstrations in proximity of work sites in an effort to disrupt normal client operations, and aggressively attempting to intimidate or influence clients.

But after filing a racketeering lawsuit against the SEIU, a weary and drained Wackenhut entered into an agreement allowing its employees in nine cities to choose SEIU as its bargaining representative. Behold the “persuasion of power.”

Showing an appalling lack of concern for the well-being of its members, the SEIU upped the ante in a representation battle with the University of Miami in 2006. The union fought tooth and nail against a true, democratic unionizing election for campus janitors using a secure, federally monitored secret ballot. Stern personally escalated the dispute, joined the fasters, and demonized then-university president Donna Shalala (yes, that Donna Shalala of Clinton yore). She lashed back:

We are devastated that the union is risking the health and well-being of our students and the Unicco employees by sanctioning an activity as drastic as a hunger strike. Hunger strikes have never been used in this country to oppose an election. We have urged both parties to continue daily discussions until this issue is resolved. A free election for or against unionization is a federal statutory right.


In the end, the SEIU relented to a federally monitored election. But at what price? Five SEIU members were hospitalized, one with a minor stroke. Wackenhut Corporation chief operating officer Paul Donahue, expressing sympathy for the University of Miami’s plight, saw the big picture:

The bullying, protesting, harassment, contrived events and demands will continue indefinitely because the union has millions of dollars in dues money from hard working janitors and other service workers which can be spent on ruining the reputation of businesses instead of bettering the lives of those workers that contributed.

Indeed, no one has felt the blunt force – and physical danger — of Stern’s “persuasion of power” more than workers themselves.

In Oakland, Stern and his Washington crew imposed a trusteeship on a 150,000-member local that had publicly opposed SEIU strong-arm tactics. The D.C.headquarters (knee deep in ethical mud) accused the local – known as SEIU United Healthcare Workers West (UHW West) – of financial malpractice and misconduct. The local fought back, charging the Beltway union leaders with manufacturing the allegations to retaliate and to distract from Washington mismanagement. The UHW West president, Sal Rosselli, quit the SEIU Executive Board, and formed a new union in February 2009, which declared: “We’re tired of SEIU’s hostile tactics, threatening phone calls, their collusion with employers and governors like Blagojovich, and the corruption of Stern’s appointees like Local 6434 head Tyrone Freeman in Los Angeles, disgraced SEIU Executive Vice President Annelle Grajada, and the appointees who have just taken over what had been our local. We don’t trust them with our contracts, we don’t trust them with our dues—we just don’t trust them.”

In Philadelphia, Stern engineered the hostile takeover of a 150,000-member union representing garment and hospitality workers. Workers United had broken off from the national UNITE HERE union of 450,000 workers. Progressive New York Daily News columnist Juan Gonzalez, citing SEIU’s agreement with Workers United, called Stern “hellbent on using classic corporate raider tactics to bring a huge portion of the U.S. labor movement under his absolute control.” The pact included discounted member dues and legal and financial assistance to aid the breakaway group’s efforts to take control of the Amalgamated Bank, the nation’s only union-owned bank. One union official called the power grab “a breathtaking form of imperialism…”

http://michellemalkin.com/2009/08/06/seiu-and-the-persuasion-of-power/

[soonercruiser]

I can't speak for God, but I damn sure hated fish stick Fridays. I despised the Catholics for that, and I still haven't forgiven them. I can't look at a fish stick without wanting to frigging puke. Fish sticks and warm milk??? That really made sense, didn't it?

Yup! The damage has been done!
:rolleyes:

[soonercruiser]

Of course!

It's the American way.

"HATE" is not the American way, yet.
But, it's some people's MO.