A union organizer whose efforts to unionize butchers, bakers, and deli and seafood workers at Genuardi's supermarkets were featured in an Inquirer report on Monday was arraigned yesterday morning on misdemeanor charges of terroristic threats and harassment brought by a union rival.
District Justice Francis J. Bernhardt sent Eric Grumbrecht, 42, of Warminster, to the Montgomery County Correctional Facility in Eagleville after Grumbrecht, an Acme butcher on disability leave, failed to post a $5,000 cash bail, according to Plymouth Township Detective Rocco Wack.
Charges against Grumbrecht were filed by Wendell Young 4th, president of United Food and Commercial Workers Local 1776 in Plymouth Township because of a conversation the two men had on Oct. 2, Wack said.
In an interview Saturday, Grumbrecht characterized the conversation as one in which he and Young exchanged playground-style insults. The conversation was overheard by two witnesses, who were with Young and listening on a speakerphone, Wack said. Grumbrecht was arrested Tuesday night. His preliminary hearing is set for next Thursday in Bernhardt's courtroom in Conshohocken.
Grumbrecht had been trying to unionize the Genuardi's workers after previous attempts by Local 1776 had failed.
Grumbrecht had filed petitions with the National Labor Relations Board to hold elections for about 85 workers at three stores. The first one, for the Genuardi's store in North Wales, is set for Oct. 19.