The LA Weekly says a federal prosecutor alleged in court documents that Miguel Contreras, the labor leader who died just before the 2005 city elections, conceived a scheme to defraud the Voter Improvement Project (which Contreras founded.) From the Weekly's blog post by Jason S. Mandell:

In 2004, court documents state, "M.C." -- Contreras -- hired then-president of SEIU Local 660 [Alejandro] Stephens and four others to pose as "consultants" for his nonprofit, Voter Improvement Program (VIP), which was funded by donations from such institutions as DreamWorks and Kaiser Permanente as well as a number of union groups.

The court documents state that Contreras had VIP's bookkeeper write checks to Stephens and his crew to perform voter outreach services. Contracts were drawn up to make the relationship appear legitimate, but it was a sham from the beginning. No one was expected to do any work at all. And no one did. They simply cashed their checks, which totaled $52,000.

Stephens pleaded guilty. He now faces up to 40 years in prison.

The nature of the "court documents" isn't disclosed in the post.