October 16, 2009: The president of a national locomotive engineers union based in Cleveland has been placed on leave after being arrested on federal charges that he accepted $20,000 in bribes from a lawyer who wanted to keep representing injured members.

Edward Rodzwicz, president of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen, which has about 55,000 members, has been on leave since Thursday, according to the union's Web site.

Union spokesman John Bentley declined to say whether Rodzwicz would be paid during his leave. Leigh Strope, a spokeswoman for the International Brotherhood of Teamsters in Washington, D.C., the national umbrella group to which the BLET belongs, also declined to comment.

Read the full story from the Cleveland Plain-Dealer.