Ex-UAW officials to be sentenced for extortion; appeals planned
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Two retired United Auto Workers officials are to be sentenced in federal
court today for extortion during a decade-old strike at the General
Motors Corp. truck plant in Pontiac.

A jury convicted Donny G. Douglas and Jay D. Campbell last June of
demanding that two unqualified men — Campbell’s son and the son of
another UAW official — be hired in high-paying skilled trades positions
if the financially crippling strike, which lasted 87 days, was to end.

The two face likely prison terms when they are sentenced by U.S.
District Judge Nancy G. Edmunds.

But today’s sentencing will not end the long-running case, since lawyers
for Douglas and Campbell are expected to appeal their convictions to the
6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

The case already has been to the 6th Circuit once. Douglas, who was a
UAW international service representative, and Campbell, who was a
longtime shop committee chairman at the plant, were indicted in
September 2002 after a four-year federal investigation.

The charges were dismissed in 2003, when Edmunds found they did not
amount to a violation of federal law. But the federal appeals court
reversed Edmunds in 2004, and the charges were reinstated.

Lawyers for Douglas, 65, of Holly, and Campbell, 65, of Davisburg argue
GM suffered no monetary loss because the hired employees received
positive evaluations and were kept on after their probationary periods.

But Assistant U.S. Attorney James Wouczyna argued in a sentencing
memorandum the union officials "were expressly tried and convicted of
extortion by threatening the property of General Motors by continuing an
ongoing strike costing millions of dollars per day."