Ex-Teamsters Official Sentenced

Former top Teamsters official William Hamilton Jr., who was convicted of charges of embezzling $885,000 in union funds to help get Ron Carey re-elected as union president, was sentenced March 14 to 36 months in prison.

Hamilton, the former political director of the nation's second-largest labor union, was convicted of federal charges that he demanded that recipients of Teamsters' campaign donations in 1996 kick back part of the money to Carey's re-election effort.

Illegal campaign funds, in part, led to Carey being banished from the Teamsters organization by a federal overseer.

Labor laws prohibit spending union money, which belongs to dues-paying members, to aid individual candidates in union elections.

At the sentencing, Hamilton's lawyer told U.S. District Judge Thomas Griesa that his client had devoted his life to public service.

"Mr. Hamilton is a committed man, hardworking, caring,

ecent," said his lawyer, Robert Gage.

The trial featured testimony from a former Democratic Party official who asserted that Terence McAuliffe, President Clinton's friend and chief fundraiser, urged other Democratic fund-raisers in 1996 to find wealthy donors willing to give up to $100,000 each to Carey's campaign.

In return, the Teamsters would donate at least $500,000 to various federal and state Democratic committees, the official testified. However, McAuliffe has denied the charge.

Carey narrowly defeated challengers James P. Hoffa in the 1996 race for control of the 1.4-million member organization. But a court-appointed election monitor threw out the result when evidence of illegal contributions surfaced. He was declared ineligible to run in new elections, which Hoffa won against two other opponents.