RALPHS INDICTED FOR LABOR VIOLATIONS

LOS ANGELES - A federal grand jury here last week indicted Ralphs Supermarkets on charges that it illegally hired locked-out workers during the Southern California labor dispute of 2003-2004.

to store and requiring them to wear name tags bearing their false names," said U.S. Attorney Debra Wong Yang in a prepared statement.

As previously reported, Ralphs, a division of Kroger Co., Cincinnati, admitted that some such hiring did occur and said it had disciplined an unspecified number of store managers who encouraged or permitted locked-out employees to work during the labor dispute.

The 53-count indictment alleges that Ralphs assigned false names and Social Security numbers to workers it hired during the dispute in an effort to conceal the activity.

In a prepared statement last week, Kroger said the hiring was not condoned or overlooked by the company, as the U.S. Attorney alleges.

"We strongly dispute the claim that the behavior of some store managers reflected a corporate plan devised to further the company's position during the prolonged labor negotiations," said Paul Heldman, senior vice president, Kroger. "The federal prosecutors simply have this wrong."

Kroger said it believes many of managers who hired locked-out workers did so "for humanitarian or personal reasons."

Ralphs said it hired more than 50,000 temporary workers during the strike, and it believes less than 1% - or about 200 workers - were locked-out employees who were rehired unlawfully.

The labor unions involved previously filed charges making similar allegations with the National Labor Relations Board, which dismissed the claims. An administrative appeal of that dismissal is pending before the NLRB in Washington. Kroger said it is "confident that the NLRB's dismissal will be upheld."