A U.S. District Court has given Overnite Transportation the green light to proceed with a federal racketeering trial against the Teamsters Union, but refused to allow any activities short of attempted murder in the suit.

The suit, filed in January of 2000, names Teamsters President James P. Hoffa and other top union officials as defendants. The suit alleged a host of illegal activities, including attempted murder.
Overnite alleged a pattern of racketeering activities during the union's job action against the company that started October 1999. It claims more than 50 "predicate acts" of attempted murder, destroying and vandalizing company and personal property, and beating and threatening non-striking Overnite employees. The suit was filed under the RICO (Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations) Act, which allows Overnite to recover triple damages and costs for injuries.
Teamsters officials named as defendants in the case argued that they should not be held responsible for the criminal activities because Overnite couldn't link them with the specific acts. The court, however, said that "RICO defendants are typically complex, hierarchical enterprises, where the offenses are perpetrated by 'underlings' at the direction of distant and removed 'bosses.'"
The court authorized Overnite to pursue 55 attempted murder claims, which Overnite spokesman Ira Rosenfeld says the company plans to "vigorously litigate."
Overnite noted that the court found "firing a gun at a truck driver on the highway may support the conclusion that the person doing the firing acted with an intent to kill. Similarly, dropping a cinder block from an overpass while a truck is passing beneath at highway speed or throwing a brick or rock at a truck's windshield when it is traveling at highway speed may be found to constitute attempted murder."
The Teamsters Union issued a press release emphasizing the fact that the court had dismissed the bulk of Overnite's "ballyhooed RICO suit." The court dismissed 171 out of the 221 predicate acts alleged by Overnite in the suit, including charges of extortion, assault, tortuous interference with business relations, and malicious destruction of property.
"The company remains confident that this limited portion of the court's ruling will be overturned on appeal," says Rosenfeld.