PHILADELPHIA _ The FBI searched homes and offices in Philadelphia and South New Jersey early Friday during an investigation into potential misuse of union money that targeted the powerful electricians local and its leader, John J. Dougherty.
The FBI, acting in concert with the IRS, executed warrants at more than half a dozen locations, including Dougherty's house in South Philadelphia, his sister's home next door, the Local 98 hall at 17th and Spring Garden streets, and the Mt. Laurel home of union president Brian Burrows.
At midday at the union headquarters, agents removed at least a hundred boxes of paperwork along with several computer hard-drives, loading them into a yellow Penske truck.
Authorities also searched the City Hall and district offices of Councilman Bobby Henon, who works for the union, holding an untitled position in which he reports directly to Dougherty.
The union reeled from the sweep of the raids as it struggled to determine the scope of the investigation.
Dougherty has led the union since 1993, helping build it into a major statewide campaign contributor. As one of the city's most powerful Democrats, he was a key force in last year's elections, helping put Jim Kenney in the mayor's office and place Dougherty's brother, Kevin Dougherty, on the state Supreme Court.
Dougherty briefly addressed reporters gathered outside his home on Friday morning, saying, "Nothing's changed in this house in the last 10, 15 years ... except the tomato plants growing in the backyard."
He set out iced tea and doughnuts for journalists who stood under a hot sun.
After a news conference on another matter, Mayor Jim Kenney was surrounded by reporters asking about the FBI raids.
"I'm not going to have any comment on this because I don't have any information," he said. "As it plays out, we'll see what happens. But I don't have any other information and you can ask the question 20 different ways, but there won't be any comment because I don't have any information."
Kenney's spokeswoman, Lauren Hitt, said later that the city had received no requests for documents from the federal government.
Dougherty and Kenney were childhood friends who grew up together in the South Philadelphia world of Democratic politics. They later became estranged in rival party camps, but reunited when Dougherty helped lead a coalition of building trades unions that used an independent expenditure group to raise money to support Kenney's 2015 mayoral bid.
At City Hall, about a dozen FBI agents converged on Henon's fourth-floor office, many wearing blue plastic gloves and going through filing cabinets and desks, paper by paper.
They arrived before 7 a.m. and left around 2 p.m., taking with them more than a dozen boxes of files and a computer.
After asking a reporter to leave, a man came outside and sat beside the door, telling inquiring journalists, "The office is closed."
Agents also raided Henon's district office on Torresdale Avenue. Neither he nor his spokeswoman, Jolene Nieves, responded to requests for comment.
The councilman's tenure as political director at Local 98 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers coincided with the union's meteoric rise in power. It became the biggest independent source of campaign money in the state.
Between 2000 and 2014, the union funneled more than $25 million into political races, money that helped get Henon elected in 2011 to a seat being vacated after 32 years by Joan Krajewski. He has embraced his ties to the electricians' leader, once saying that without Dougherty, "I wouldn't be where I'm at."
At union president Burrow's South Jersey home, cars stood in the driveway, but the shades were drawn.
Several neighbors said they saw the raid take place at 8 or 9 a.m., when four or five vehicles, including a marked Mt. Laurel police car, appeared at the home. Agents in FBI vests spent roughly an hour removing boxes of files from the house, neighbors said.
No one answered a reporter's knock on the Burrows' door. Shortly afterward, two police officers arrived in separate vehicles and said the family had called to say they wanted the reporter to leave.
A search also took place at Doc's Pub in South Philadelphia, a building owned by Dougherty, Burrows and the head of the union's apprentice program, Michael Neill.
At the bar on Friday, Steve Pakech, 70, described Dougherty as a sort of neighborhood organizer who takes care of people in the community.
"He put a lot of people to work. He does a lot for the neighborhood," Pakech said. "It's election time, and I think (the FBI is) just trying to bother people."
An FBI spokeswoman said the searches were part of an ongoing inquiry, but declined to provide further details. However, a law enforcement official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the investigation had been underway for more than two years and involved the possible misuse of funds.
Another official said the investigation involved a "broad scope" of activity that dated back years.
"They are looking at the wrong guy," insisted Patrick Gillespie, former business manager of the Philadelphia Building Trades Council, a position held by Dougherty since Gillespie's fall retirement.
Every few years, he said, the FBI decides to investigate Dougherty, and they always come up empty handed.
"My heart goes out to John," he said. "I know he acts like he is tough and this is the price of doing business, when you speak up and when you do the right thing for people ... . This is almost like a rogue situation. It's like they're after terrorists."
The union chief is no stranger to law enforcement scrutiny.
In February, the FBI and Pennsylvania attorney general's office opened an investigation into an incident in which Dougherty punched a nonunion contractor at a South Philadelphia worksite. City District Attorney Seth Williams said his "long-standing professional relationship" with Dougherty barred him from handling the matter and referred the case to the attorney general's office. No charges have been filed.
Federal agents previously searched Dougherty's house in 2006. In its request for a search warrant, the FBI alleged that Dougherty's bank records showed a pattern of deposits and withdrawals of substantial amounts of cash in "what appears to be an effort to conceal financial dealings." No charges were filed.
The FBI said that from 2002 to 2005, Dougherty deposited about $106,000 in cash that could not be traced to any known source, according to the warrant application. The FBI also alleged that Dougherty received about $300,000 in free renovations to his South Philadelphia home.
Dougherty's lawyer told investigators that the labor leader received $200,000 from his wife's parents to pay for much of the renovations. But federal agents subpoenaed his in-laws' bank records and found that they lived "paycheck to paycheck" and had no "large sums of cash" to give to their son-in-law, according to the 55-page application.
A government filing shows that in 2015 Dougherty received $406,532 from the union, including $226,754 as salary.
Union documents say he spent 80 percent of his time representing the union and its administration, and 10 percent on political activities and lobbying.
Burrows, the president, earned a total of $189,677, most of it in salary, and including $15,231 for business expenses.
Most top officers earned between $145,000 and $190,000.
In 2015, the union paid tens of thousands of dollars to electrical contractors in what are called "market recovery funds," according to federal documents. Those funds are commonly paid to a union contractor that may be bidding against a nonunion crew for work.
That allows the union contractor to submit a lower bid and win the job. This often happens in the suburbs, where building trades have a weaker grip on the labor market.
One of the largest payments, $100,000, went to Dougherty Electric, a South Philadelphia company.
In 2008, company owner Donald "Gus" Dougherty, who is not related to John Dougherty, pleaded guilty to federal criminal charges that included doing free work for the union chief.
Gus Dougherty was sentenced to two years in prison and ordered to pay $1.6 million in back taxes.
