On January 26, Carmen Martinez, former treasurer of Bet Tzedek Legal Service Union Local 946, an affiliate of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court for the Central District of California to one count of embezzling funds from the Los Angeles union in the amount of $19,070. AFSCME Local 946, along with its sister union, Local 800, has a collective bargaining agreement (and a barely sustainable one at that) with Bet Tzedek, a progressive-oriented nonprofit affiliate of the Jewish Federation of Greater Los Angeles. The guilty plea follows an investigation by the U.S. Labor Department’s Office of Labor-Management Standards.
