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Search warrant executed at New York Times office

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Police search New York newspaper circulation offices
From Mythili Rao, CNN
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
Authorities say they are conducting investigations into "business activity"
Offices include New York Times, New York Post, New York Daily News, El Diario
Local media cites investigation of the Newspaper and Mail Deliverers' Union of New York
Police officials refuse to discuss investigation
RELATED TOPICS
New York City
Newspapers
New York (CNN) -- The New York Police Department executed search warrants Tuesday at some offices of The New York Times, The New York Daily News, The New York Post and El Diario newspapers and at a labor union, with authorities saying they were conducting investigations into "business activity."

Local media reports categorized the action as searches of the newspapers' circulation offices in connection with an investigation of the Newspaper and Mail Deliverers' Union of New York.

Deputy Police Commissioner Paul J. Browne confirmed the searches to CNN but neither he nor other city officials would elaborate on the investigation or discuss Tuesday's actions.

District Attorney Robert Morgenthau said in a statement, "Today police officers executed search warrants obtained by the District Attorney's office at locations including the offices of a number of print media organizations and a labor union.

"The investigation solely concerns business activity and practice and is completely unrelated to the content of any publication. The investigation is continuing. We can offer no further information at this time."

Reached by phone, the Newspaper and Mail Deliverers' Union's secretary-treasurer, Steven Goldstein, said that the union was not commenting.

Suzi Halpin, a spokesperson for The New York Post, declined to comment. Calls made to The New York Daily News and El Diario were not returned.

Diane McNulty, a spokeswoman for The New York Times, said that police executed a warrant to search the office of an employee at College Point in the Queens section of New York, but that, "The New York Times Company is not a target of the investigation."








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© 2008 Cable News Network
 
"Business activity"? Since it's New York and a labor union was mentioned, I am going to go ahead and say it's mafia related.
 
Oh, that must have been thrilling for the New York Times!

I'll go with Sparky on his call. Trucks and deliverers somehow brings up images of teamsters, otherwise I might have guessed narcotics.

Title for a thriller: Crime in the Castle. :lol:
 
Oh, that must have been thrilling for the New York Times!

I'll go with Sparky on his call. Trucks and deliverers somehow brings up images of teamsters, otherwise I might have guessed narcotics.

Title for a thriller: Crime in the Castle. :lol:

:lol:

Good one!
 
Looks like I was right.

The Associated Press: AP source: NYC newspapers' delivery offices raided

NEW YORK — Investigators in the city raided offices for some of the nation's largest newspapers Tuesday as part of a corruption probe into a powerful union that has long faced accusations of ties to organized crime, a law enforcement official said.

Police officers working with the Manhattan district attorney's office searched for paperwork related to the Newspaper and Mail Deliverers Union in circulation, production and delivery offices of The New York Times, the New York Post, the Daily News and El Diario, said the official, who spoke to The Associated Press on the condition of anonymity because the investigation is ongoing.

District Attorney Robert Morgenthau said search warrants also were executed at a labor union, but he would not specify which.

"The investigation solely concerns business activity and practice and is completely unrelated to the content of any publication," he said.

The Times, Daily News and El Diario-La Prensa confirmed their offices were searched but said their companies were not subjects of the investigation. The Post declined to comment.

El Diario-La Prensa Publisher Rosana Rosado said the search warrant sought information into allegations of corruption at the union, which packages and delivers newspapers across the region. The Times said the office of an employee at its plant in the College Point area of Queens had been searched.

The 1,600-member union wields considerable power over news companies that rely on their drivers to deliver hundreds of thousands of papers each day, and allegations of connections to organized crime are not new. Calls to the union's headquarters were not answered Tuesday. The news deliverers' parent union, the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, referred inquiries to the local union.

The Audit Bureau of Circulations, a nonprofit association of advertisers, ad agencies and publishers that provides media audits, had no comment on the investigation.

Morgenthau once charged the newspaper union was under mob control for decades and sought to have a court-appointed trustee take it over in 1992, after an investigation that also involved a search of the Post and Daily News offices.

"The mob has been in control so long that it will take a special master with special powers to clean up the union," Morgenthau said then.

The union rackets ultimately raised operating costs for newspapers, prosecutors said.

The probe led to criminal charges against union members including then-President Douglas LaChance, whom authorities accused of being an associate of the Luchese crime family. He had been convicted of federal labor racketeering charges in 1980 and served about five years of a 12-year sentence.

He was acquitted in the 1990s Manhattan case, which accused him of strong-arming the Post into switching delivery companies.

Copyright © 2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.


I wonder how much these rackets hit the newspapers' bottom lines.
 
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