Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, January 6, 1993 TAG: 9301060064
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: A5 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: RICHMOND LENGTH: Medium
BLACKLISTED PILOT SEEKS TO SUE
A former pilot should be allowed to sue a union that blacklisted him for working during the Eastern Airlines strike in 1989, his lawyer told the Virginia Supreme Court on Tuesday.Aron Krantz also is seeking to sue a former colleague who posted a message on the Air Line Pilots Association computer bulletin board denouncing Krantz as "a scab."
Eastern folded after the strike, and Krantz contends he has been unable to get a job with another airline because of the union's blacklist. He said he was on the verge of landing a job at United Airlines before Richard W. Nottke, who worked with him at Eastern, sent the derogatory message into the union's Fairfax County-based computer system.
Robert Gore, a National Right To Work Legal Defense Foundation Inc. attorney representing Krantz, said the union distributed 50,000 copies of the blacklist containing the names of more than 2,200 pilots who worked or offered to work during the Eastern strike.
Fairfax County Circuit Judge Jack B. Stevens last year dismissed Krantz's suit against the union. He said the case belonged in federal court because it is related to the Eastern strike and therefore covered by federal labor law.
The suit against Nottke was dismissed by Fairfax County Circuit Judge Thomas A. Fortkort. Nottke was in New York when he put his message into the computer and therefore could not be prosecuted in Virginia, the judge ruled.
Gore argued that Nottke can be sued in Virginia under the state's "long-arm statute." He said Nottke, in effect, reached into Virginia electronically and manipulated the computer to put out his "get-Krantz message."
But Anker said the location of the caller determines jurisdiction.