Philadelphia Union Leader Arrested On Extortion Charges After Threatening Contractor

John “Johnny Doc” Dougherty, an influential Philadelphia union leader, is facing federal charges of extortion after threatening a contractor about unpaid wages.

Dougherty, the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 98 union leader, was arrested by federal law enforcement agents Wednesday morning at his home and detained at FBI offices in Philadelphia, according to local news reports.

“Today, after John just returned home after spending 12 days at his seriously ill wife Ceilie’s bedside in the Intensive Care Unit of Jefferson Hospital, they descended again upon John and Ceilie’s home and arrested him again. This isn’t a prosecution, it’s a persecution,” Frank Keel, Dougherty’s spokesperson, said in a statement.

According to a federal indictment, Dougherty was involved in an August 2020 extortion incident when his nephew, Gregory Fiocca, allegedly threatened and assaulted a contractor.

Fiocca, who was the IBEW Local 98 steward for the contractor, has been accused of using “force and violence, and threats of violence and economic harm against a contractor who employed Fiocca for services he alleged failed to perform.”

At the time, the contractor wouldn’t pay Fiocca for 40 hours of work, since the steward didn’t work the hours he was requesting compensation for, NBC Philadelphia reported. Fiocca said he was “calling my uncle already. We’re pulling everyone off the job.”

The indictment claimed Dougherty threatened to stop union electricians from working overtime, pulled workers from the project, or interfered with the contractor obtaining a bigger contract.

Dougherty is currently out on a $50,000 unsecured bond. He was out on pretrial release in a larger case in which he was accused of inappropriately using more than $600,000 in union funds.

Dougherty, along with Philadelphia city councilman Bobby Henon and six other defendants, were arrested in January 2019 on a 116-count indictment that included embezzlement charges.