A Transport Workers Union big has gotten the boot for trying to improperly punish an alleged philandering bus-driver rep, the TWU said.
John Paul “JP” Patafio, TWU Local 100’s vice president for its Brooklyn bus division, inserted himself into the suspected messy love triangle at a Queens depot by attempting to demote the rep, who was allegedly cheating on his bus-driver wife with another MTA bus driver at the same depot, the union’s disciplinary trial committee said.
Patafio did “not have the authority to remove an elected official from his position, absent written charges and a trial,” the panel said.
Yet he demanded that the male bus-driver rep stop allegedly cheating on his wife with the other driver — and attempted to unilaterally suspend him from his union post for six months without filing formal disciplinary charges against him, the union said.
The decision said Patafio’s intervention may have been motivated by a separate dispute over the backing of a candidate for a vacant position in a union election.
“The motivation for removing [the rep], whether because of the vacancy election or the personal situation, is not relevant for a determination of a violation of the Constitution,” said trial committee Chairman Michael Capocci in his decision, which Patafio received Tuesday.
“J. P. Patafio should be removed from office as Vice President. By majority decision the Trial Committee recommends that J.P. Patafio should be placed in bad standing for a period of three years,” he wrote.
Patafio slammed the decision as “absurd” and “stupefying.
“They removed me as if I were the one caught cheating. They removed me and rewarded the cheater. It’s insane,” Patafio told The Post.
The decision, expected to be upheld by union brass, bars him from running for union office for three years, he said.
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