Jury acquits former Local 1011 officers of fraud

SOUTH BEND | A federal jury has acquitted two former union officials of charges they defrauded their membership by improperly padding their salaries.

Jurors issued not guilty verdicts Thursday during the fourth day of the trial for Loren Hanson, of New Mexico, a former president of United Steelworkers Local 1011, and Jesse Lee Daniels Sr., of Chicago, a former financial secretary for the union local representing more than 1,300 employees of the ArcelorMittal plant in East Chicago.

A federal grand jury, relying on a U.S. Department of Labor investigation, indicted the two men last year on embezzlement charges alleging they conspired between 2005 and 2009 to write $41,000 in unauthorized checks for each other.

Their trial began Monday before U.S. District Court Judge Jon DeGuilio and ended in their acquittal of all charges.

Mary Hatton, a spokeswoman for the Hammond U.S. attorney's office that prosecuted the case, didn't return a call seeking comment.

Merrillville defense lawyer Kevin Milner, representing Hanson, and Chicago defense lawyer Elliot Zinger, representing Daniels, argued their clients never intended to improperly enrich themselves and that the government's case relied upon an erroneous union document.

"This was an accident, a mistake," Milner said.