Verizon has, according to
CNN, "called in the FBI" because:
Verizon spokesman Rich Young said more than 90 acts of sabotage have taken place since the strike began on Sunday. Saboteurs have cut phone lines, affecting the service of several thousand customers primarily in New York and New Jersey but also in Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, and Delaware.
Acts of sabotage are hardly uncommon in contentious labor strife's, but Young said that these acts "cross the line." A police station and a hospital were among those that lost service as a result of the sabotage, he said.
Federal Bureau of Investigation spokesman Jim Margolin confirmed that an inquiry is under way and is being handled out of the FBI's Newark, N.J., field office.
With the Communications Workers of America taking a strong anti-sabotage position, presumably what the FBI finds, if it finds anything, will be a mixture of non-coordinated acts by individuals scattered across states and things that weren't sabotage but were reported as such to make a better story. For that matter, it's not impossible that Verizon is participating in an old tradition of employers sabotaging themselves to make their striking workers look bad.
Meanwhile,
CWA spokeswoman Candice Johnson accused Verizon replacement workers and managers of driving vehicles into picketing crowds, striking more than a dozen pickets.
Verizon's Young accused the strikers of throwing themselves in front of vehicles, which Johnson called "ridiculous."
Both sets of allegations have been traded all week. Maybe if the unions want their side to lead CNN coverage of the strike, they should ask the FBI to investigate a possible conspiracy of Verizon managers and scabs clipping picketers with their cars.