CBS 13
Sacramento, CA
Nov 6, 2009
A state worker is recovering after a bloody brawl at a union hall. He says members of the local SEIU 1000 beat him up and sent him to the hospital all because he wanted to expose alleged corruption within the union.
Ken Hamidi is a state worker at the California Franchise Tax Board. Last night he walked into a union hall in Sacramento for an SEIU local 1000 meeting.
“We had every right to be here, very simple; it wasn’t anything private or anything exclusive,” said Hamidi.
But Hamidi says the union members did not want him there.
“Three, four people jumped at me, wrestled with me, then did all that,” said Hamidi. “I was covered in blood and then over to the emergency room.”
Photos of Hamidi in the hospital show him bloodied from the brawl. So why did this happen? Besides being a state worker, Hamidi says he’s an unpaid reporter for a cable access show and a vocal critic of the SEIU. He calls the state workers’ union corrupt.
“This is a union hall that is leased and is being furnished and equipped and everything with our money,” said Hamidi.
Hamidi says he came to the hall to expose how he says SEIU union leaders are spending tens of thousands of dollars on a political race, he claims, they have no right to do. After he and a photographer walked in to the meeting, it didn’t take long for Hamidi to be right out the door and on his way to the hospital.
We called SEIU union leaders to get their side of the story, but they refused to comment.
No criminal charges have been filed in this case.
