Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, June 2, 1993 TAG: 9306020163
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: GREG EDWARDS STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
The U.S. Supreme Court agreed Tuesday to hear the UMW's appeal of $53 million in fines levied during the union's 1989-90 strike against Pittston Coal Group companies in Southwest Virginia.
If the nation's high court agrees with the Virginia Supreme Court and upholds the fines, the UMW will pay the money to the state treasury and to Russell and Dickenson counties, which faced law-enforcement and other expenses because of the strike.
Bob Stropp, general counsel for the union, said he was pleased with the court's decision to hear the appeal.
Roanoke lawyer Frank Friedman, part of the legal team that represents John Bagwell of Grundy, a special commissioner named by a Russell County judge to collect the fines, said the decision means that the case raises important legal questions that the court wants to deal with. "We feel the Virginia Supreme Court got it right," he said.
Russell County Circuit Judge Donald McGlothlin Jr. fined the union for violating injunctions he issued at Pittston's request to limit picketing and control strike violence. The strike involved 1,700 Pittston workers at mines in Virginia, West Virginia and Kentucky, with most activity in Virginia.
During the strike, rock-throwing and other violence was reported, for which the union claimed it was not responsible.
At the strike's conclusion in February 1990, both Pittston and the union asked McGlothlin to drop the fines. He agreed to dismiss $11 million he had ordered the UMW to pay Pittston but left in place the remaining penalties that he had awarded to state and local governments.
The Virginia Court of Appeals dismissed roughly half McGlothlin's fines, but in November the Virginia Supreme Court overruled the appeals court and in a unanimous decision by the court's seven justices upheld all the fines.
The union argued the fines were excessive and unconstitutional. The union also claimed that once the strike was settled the court no longer had authority to fine the union.
In upholding the fines, the Virginia Supreme Court agreed they were large but found they were not excessive. The fines also were the only means the trial court had to enforce the UMW's compliance with its injunctions, the state court said.
Oral arguments in the Supreme Court appeal are not expected until at least fall.
The timing could make the appeal an issue in this fall's Virginia governor's race.
Republicans attacked then-Attorney General Mary Sue Terry, now the Democratic nominee for governor, in 1990 when she decided not to use her office to fight for the fines after the UMW first appealed.
Tom King, a spokesman for Terry, said he doubted Republicans would raise the issue again. "Mary Sue took the correct position, as opposed to the political position."o
by CNB