Marita Crawford, one of labor leader Johnny Doc’s closest allies, sentenced to 15 days in prison in embezzlement case

Michael Neill (center), former director of Local 98 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Worker’s apprentice training program, leaving U.S. Courthouse after sentencing Tuesday in Reading.

READING — The woman who, with labor leader John Dougherty, helped transform Local 98 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers into the state’s most politically powerful labor union was sentenced to 15 days behind bars Wednesday for stealing from the workers whose interests she’d been hired to represent.

At left is Marita Crawford, former political director Local 98 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Worker, arriving for sentencing at the U.S. Courthouse in Reading on Wednesday. A federal judge sentenced her to 15 days behind bars, followed by three months of house arrest.

Marita Crawford served as the union’s political director for roughly a decade before pleading guilty to wire fraud charges in 2022 and agreeing to repay nearly $12,000 spent over several years on expenses such as hotel stays, hair and makeup services, birthday dinners for herself and Dougherty.

But although prosecutors blamed Dougherty for directing her to charge many of those expenses to Local 98 credit cards, Crawford, at a hearing before U.S. District Judge Jeffrey Schmehl, maintained that the blame was hers alone.

“I’ve been told over and over that I was put in a bad situation at the union and others are responsible for my conduct,” she told the judge. “I’m here to say that’s not true. I made the mistake, and I alone take responsibility.”

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Schmehl acknowledged Crawford’s contrition and credited her accomplishments as a single mother working in the male-dominated worlds of labor unions and politics. Still, given her leadership position in Local 98, she deserved some time behind bars for her crimes, he said.

In addition to the term of incarceration, the judge ordered Crawford, 54, to serve three months’ house arrest and pay more than $14,000 in fines and restitution to the union.

“You did hold a position of power within the union,” he said. “The fellow members of IBEW trusted you, they relied on you, and you let them down.”

Crawford’s sentence makes her the second Local 98 official to get prison time for what prosecutors have described as a large-scale embezzlement scheme led by Dougherty, who served as Local 98′s business manager for nearly 30 years.

In all, he, Crawford and five others have been convicted of siphoning a total of more than $600,000 between 2010 and 2016 that went to items such as restaurant meals and home repairs as well as more mundane items such as groceries, diapers, and Christmas decorations.

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Schmehl sentenced Local 98′s former head of apprentice training, Michael Neill, to 13 months in prison on Tuesday — roughly half of the up to two years prosecutors had been seeking.

The sentence the judge gave Crawford on Wednesday also fell on the low end of a prison term of up to six months that government lawyers recommended. Her lawyer, Fortunato Perri Jr., had pushed for probation.

“Union members relied on her to give political power to their collective voices, and they paid her hundreds of thousands of dollars to do it,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Anthony Carissimi said. “Nevertheless, she stole from them.”

Though Crawford did not testify against Dougherty at either of his two felony trials — his first, a 2021 bribery case alongside former City Councilmember Bobby Henon, and his second, which wrapped in December with his conviction in the embezzlement scheme — her voice, caught on dozens of wiretaps, was a frequent presence throughout both.

Prosecutors played hours of recorded conversations for jurors revealing her as a close confidant to Dougherty, with whom she was romantically involved at the time, and a go-to ally in advancing — and sometimes enforcing — Local 98′s considerable political clout.

Together, they helped shape their union into a political juggernaut with a track record of propelling dozens of allies into elected office. That list includes mayors such as former Philadelphia Mayor Jim Kenney, City Council members such as Henon as well as county commissioners, members of Congress, state lawmakers, governors, and judges such as the union leader’s brother, Pennsylvania Supreme Court Justice Kevin Dougherty.

It was Crawford, Assistant U.S. Attorney Frank Costello said in court papers leading up to Wednesday’s sentencing, who served as the primary messenger delivering Dougherty’s demands to Henon throughout their bribery scheme.

“John is the boss,” she told one City Hall political operative in a November 2015 call played at his first trial. “That’s it.”

Prosecutors opted not to charge Crawford in that political corruption case, despite referring to her in court papers as an “unindicted coconspirator” with Dougherty and Henon.

They focused instead on the expenses she billed to union accounts — including $2,500 in gift cards to the clothing store Boyd’s that she bought for Dougherty, birthday dinners worth hundreds of dollars, and more than $500 in beauty services at the Manhattan Waldorf Astoria.

Crawford also admitted to misspending nearly $500 from the political action committee of South Philadelphia’s First Democratic Ward — over which Dougherty held considerable sway — on a 2016 birthday dinner for herself.

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She apologized for those crimes Wednesday, saying she’d become caught up in trying to prove herself.

“It has not been easy working in the male-dominated world of the building trades,” she said. “I felt pressure to work harder and to a higher standard than my male colleagues. … I became lost in trying to prove myself. … I wanted to be the first woman to do it, and I wanted to do it best.”

The case against her, she said, left her humiliated.

As she awaited Schmehl’s decision, Crawford nervously moved about the courtroom, hugging and quietly thanking the half-dozen people who had shown up to support her. She appeared visibly upset as the judge announced she’d be headed to prison. A family member seated in the gallery hung his head in his hands.

But others, who’d written letters to the judge or come to testify on her behalf Wednesday, insisted that Crawford had plenty to be proud of in her career — one she’s continued to pursue as a consultant to political campaigns since resigning from Local 98 in 2022.

“She hasn’t just helped union members, she’s helped every single working man and woman in Pennsylvania,” said Robert Bair, president of the Pennsylvania Building Trades Council, an umbrella organization of labor unions across the state. “The legislation and policy that Ms. Crawford helped pass props up the right to a good job, retirement, living wages, and health care for everyone.”

Dougherty is scheduled to face sentencing in May. His former driver and personal assistant, Niko Rodriguez, is scheduled for sentencing Thursday.

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