George Scalise

George Scalise was the former president of the Building Service Employees International Union (BSEIU) who was convicted of racketeering due to the exposure of labor racketeering by newspaper columnist Westbrook Pegler, who won a Pulitzer Prize in 1941 for his reporting.[1]

The BSEIU (known as the Service Employees International Union since 1968) was founded in 1921 in Chicago to represent janitors, elevator operators, and window washers. Membership increased significantly with a 1934 strike in New York City's Garment District.

Scalise, who rose to head the union due to his connections with organized crime, was indicted by New York District Attorney Thomas E. Dewey, charged with extorting $100,000 from employers over three years. Convicted of labor racketeering, Scalise was sentenced to 10–20 years in prison.[2]

  1. ^ "The Pulitzer Prizes".
  2. ^ Witwer, David (Summer 2003). "The Scandal of George Scalise: A Case Study in the Rise of Labor Racketeering in the 1930s". Journal of Social History. 36 (4): 917–940. doi:10.1353/jsh.2003.0121. S2CID 143544135.