The investors built an upscale sports club and restaurant on the property secured by a $1.1 million loan from the Teamsters' Central States Pension Fund.

Jackie Presser quickly helped make the Ohio Conference a model within the Teamsters for providing social services, engaging in union-member communications, and undertaking effective political activity.

Bill met with Roy Lee Williams, then president of the Central Conference of Teamsters, a regional council which controlled union locals in 14 Midwestern states, including Ohio.

[1][6][8][9][10] As an international vice president, Presser urged the Teamsters to root out corruption and pushed for a massive public relations campaign to improve the union's image.

In 1977, the Teamsters built a large public relations operation at its headquarters in Washington, D.C. Presser soon won authorization for a $250,000-a-year advertising campaign, and the union began sponsoring football games on the radio.

The Department of Justice had charged Presser and others with making improper loans to mob-controlled Las Vegas casinos, racetracks and real estate investments.

In 1978, Presser was named a defendant in a civil suit brought by the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL), which sought damages and reimbursement on behalf of union retirees.

John Nardi, a high-ranking Teamster leader, formed a coalition with mobster Danny Greene to seize control of the Cleveland crime family.

The media soon reported that Presser was reputed to have links to organized crime and that he was the object of a DOL civil suit for financial malfeasance.

[32] Days later, the Cleveland Plain Dealer newspaper reported that court documents and unidentified law enforcement officials had confirmed that Presser and his father had served as government informants while taking $300,000 in kickbacks from a Las Vegas public relations firm connected to organized crime.

[34] The mob's confidence in Presser was reaffirmed a year later when the Justice Department publicly ended its investigation into the alleged kickback scheme.

It was Presser who had turned over the critical evidence which showed Williams had arranged to give Sen. Cannon a parcel of land as a bribe to defeat trucking deregulation legislation.

Instead, mafia families in Chicago, Cleveland and various cities on the East Coast had met shortly after Williams' resignation announcement and picked Presser to lead the Teamsters.

But mob leaders Angelo Lonardo, Anthony "Fat Tony" Salerno, and Milton "Maishe" Rockman (Scalish's brother-in-law) met with mafia officials throughout the country to build support for a Presser presidency.

It was the first time the Labor Department won restitution from individual pension fund trustees under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA).

Presser arrived in the ballroom accompanied by composer Aaron Copland's Fanfare for the Common Man, four muscular men dressed as Roman centurions bearing him on a golden sedan chair.

On the eve of the Republican National Convention, Presser told the press that Dotson's removal was a "do-or-die situation" for the Teamsters, which held more NLRB-supervised organizing elections than any other union.

In January 1983, the employer organization which governed collective bargaining activities in the trucking industry asked the Teamsters to re-open its contract and approve significant wage reductions.

But since the "no" vote did not meet the two-thirds majority required to overturn a contract and authorize a strike, Presser ordered national union officials to impose the pact.

[77] In early 1985, the President's Commission on Organized Crime issued a sealed subpoena ordering Presser to testify about mafia influence in the Teamsters union.

[80] Other witnesses testified that Presser had given his approval to the Brotherhood of Loyal Americans and Strong Teamsters (BLAST), a group set up to intimidate TDU members.

In October 1985, the Commission renewed its efforts to question Presser after it was revealed that the Department of Justice had decided not to prosecute him for padding the payroll at Local 507.

Under a grant of immunity, Williams testified extensively about Presser's offer to fix a 1974 criminal case for $10,000 and his desire to obtain kickbacks for helping to arrange a 1975 Teamsters pension fund loan to organized crime figures so they could purchase a Las Vegas casino.

He planned a five-year legal, public relations, legislative and political counter-attack to keep the Teamsters free from court supervision, and sought and won AFL-CIO support for his proposals.

He also led a massive lobbying effort in Congress to oppose the takeover on fiscal and libertarian philosophical grounds designed to appeal to Republicans.

[89] In May 1988, federal prosecutors cut back their effort to take over the Teamsters after losing a criminal trial against Anthony "Fat Tony" Salerno.

Finally, on May 16, 1985, top Justice Department officials ordered federal attorneys to drop their prosecution of Presser over concerns that his extensive cooperation with the government would be revealed.

[102] Presser went home, but was re-admitted to the hospital on June 27 suffering from cardiac problems, a blood clot in his lung and pituitary gland dysfunction.

[1] Hours after Presser's funeral on July 12, Teamster leaders met at a nearby restaurant and agreed to support William J. McCarthy as his successor.

[5] A 1992 made-for-TV movie was produced for HBO about his time in office, called Teamster Boss: The Jackie Presser Story, which starred Brian Dennehy and Jeff Daniels.