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November 12, 2006

Another Stardust tale

The late Al Sachs and Herb Tobman regretted not fighting charges of skimming. They are seen as the final link in the shift from the old Vegas to the corporate age.
By Ed Koch, Las Vegas Sun
Las Vegas Sun


All but forgotten amid the closure of the Stardust Nov. 1 were the brief but colorful roles played at the Strip resort by Al Sachs and Herb Tobman. They as much as anyone oversaw the transition Las Vegas was undergoing at the time.

Sachs and Tobman took over the Stardust in 1979 after gaming golden boy Allen Glick and gambler Frank "Lefty" Rosenthal were run out by state gaming authorities. But by 1984, veteran gamer Sachs and venerable businessman Tobman also were ousted amid allegations of skimming - charges similar to the ones that doomed their predecessors.

Sachs and Tobman were fined what was at the time a record $3.5 million as part of the agreement to surrender ownership of the Stardust and their gaming licenses. The resort then was taken over by Boyd Gaming, which ran it for the last 22 years and plans to build on the site the $4 billion Echelon Place, featuring four major resorts.

Sachs and Tobman often told friends they regretted not fighting the allegations. To the end - Sachs died in 2002 and Tobman this year - they maintained they did not skim or otherwise work for the mob.

Their legacy is one of transition from the old mob-run Las Vegas to the corporate gaming era that in the last two decades has cleaned up the international image of the state's leading industry.

"It was a transitional time, especially for me," said former U.S. Sen. Richard Bryan, who was governor when Sachs and Tobman were ousted. "When I was growing up here in the 1950s, there was an understanding that (gaming authorities) did not focus so much on what you did before you got to Las Vegas. You'd get your license, keep your nose clean and you were left alone.

"But by the time I was attorney general and then governor, it had become clear that many of those old gamers had connections to national networks that were unacceptable in the modern era."

As big a story as the Sachs/Tobman ouster was in 1984, many of today's Las Vegas residents know little of it. It was barely a footnote in stories published last week about the closing of the Stardust.

Sachs was a highly knowledgeable but unpretentious gaming executive who was popular with his employees.

Tobman was more active in civic affairs, serving as chairman of the Clark County Heart Fund, active with Temple Beth Shalom and co-founder of WestCare, a Las Vegas drug rehabilitation center.

"They had great weight in the community," said Michael Green, a Community College of Southern Nevada history professor and Tobman's distant cousin. "And what they did was not as egregious as what happened during Frank Rosenthal's era. Thus they are neither as famous nor as infamous as Rosenthal."

The character "Ace" Rothstein, portrayed by Robert De Niro in the 1995 film "Casino," was based on Rosenthal, who today lives in Florida and operates a handicapping Web site. Rosenthal is in the state's Black Book, banning him from Las Vegas casinos as an undesirable.

UNLV history professor Gene Moehring, who with Green co-wrote the book "Las Vegas: A Centennial History," said another reason Sachs and Tobman are not well remembered historically is because there is little that people want to remember from the Las Vegas of the early 1980s.

"Las Vegas was in an unusual transition," he said. "The town was dying and needed something new. Sachs and Tobman simply did not have the capital to do what was needed to be done to save the Stardust."

And that was grow up.

Moehring said that from the mid-1960s through the early 1970s, Caesars Palace opened, followed by the International (today the Las Vegas Hilton) and the MGM Grand (today Bally's) - resorts that built upward, differing from the low-rise resorts of the 1950s such as the Sands, Desert Inn and Stardust.

"Prior to (its operators) reluctantly building a tower, the Stardust was just a big 1,000-room motel," Moehring said. "Many casino operators of that time did not see the need for 2,000-plus rooms that are required today."

But that became the trend after Steve Wynn opened the Mirage in 1989, five years after Sachs and Tobman were gone from gaming.

The Mirage started a wave of growth along the Strip, leaving in its wake implosions of the older resorts to make way for new megaresorts. After the wave washed away the Sands and the Desert Inn, it was just a matter of time before it engulfed the Stardust.

"When the Mirage opened, all of the older Las Vegas hotels became dumps," Moehring said. "Who really wanted to stay at the older places when there was the Mirage?"

Allan David "Al" Sachs had a meteoric rise in gaming from dealer to casino owner. Sachs began his gaming career in the 1940s as a dealer in illegal Chicago gaming houses. He also worked in the legal pre-Fidel Castro casinos in Cuba.

Sachs opened the Royal Nevada Casino in 1955 and, three years later, became a minor investor in the Tropicana. In the early 1970s, Sachs was president of the Stardust. But he left in the mid-1970s over disagreements with Glick and Rosenthal about how the casino should be operated and, in 1977, became the casino manager at the Aladdin.

Tobman and Sachs, formed Trans-Sterling Inc. in 1979, to take over the Stardust. At one point in the 1980s, Sachs owned the Stardust, Fremont and Sundance (now Fitzgeralds ) hotels

Tobman had a more diverse career. He bought and sold real estate, ran a furniture store, operated the popular Mr. T's Diner on Industrial Road and was a longtime owner of Western Cab Co.

Tobman, who in his youth worked as a Catskill Mountains resort bellhop and in his late 20s was a Las Vegas gas station attendant, served on the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority board and on other boards.

Tobman's gaming career began in the 1950s when he was appointed general manager of the Moulin Rouge on Bonanza Road, the town's first integrated casino.

In 1971 Tobman was hired as general manager of the Aladdin, where he instituted a champagne dinner buffet.

In 1974, Sachs - who was then Stardust president - promoted Tobman to vice president. Two months later, after Sachs quarrelled with Glick and Rosenthal, Tobman succeeded Sachs as Stardust president.

The fine that Sachs and Tobman paid upon surrendering their licenses stood as a record until 2003 when the Mirage was fined $5 million for failing to file 15,000 anti-money laundering reports with the federal government.

In 1985, Sachs and Tobman claimed in federal court documents that they took the government's deal "under duress." In July of that year, U.S. District Judge Roger Foley dismissed their civil suit that claimed that the state violated Sachs and Tobman's civil rights.

In 1986 Tobman, who had run unsuccessfully for Clark County Commission 20 years earlier, ran for governor, raising $90,000 while limiting campaign donations to no more than $10 per contributor. He lost in the Democratic primary to Bryan.

Sachs retired from gaming and spent his remaining years out of the limelight at his residences in Malibu, Calif., and Las Vegas. He died of complications of pneumonia at age 76. Tobman remained an active local businessmen until he died of a heart attack in March at age 81.

Las Vegas: Sin City

By David Amoruso

“There are [a lot of] places of worship in Las Vegas, but there is only one true god: money.” From The Green Felt Jungle

A century ago Mark Twain wrote the following about Nevada: “In Nevada the lawyer, the editor, the banker, the chief desperado, the chief gambler, and the saloonkeeper occupied the same level of society, and it was the heighest. [...] To be a saloonkeeper and kill a man was to be illustrious.”

In the summer of 1941 Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel sent Moe Sedway to Nevada to establish the Trans-America wire service there. T-A wire service was controlled by the Chicago Outfit. Gus Greenbaum had established T-A in Arizona, and Siegel with help from Jack Dragna and Mickey Cohen in California. It was Sedway’s task to establish it in Nevada. Sedway was considered a nobody. He pulled off the task though. Siegel went to Las Vegas himself in 1942 to tell the casinos that the wire service could be obtained by handing Siegel all or some (depending on the casino) of the income from the casinos bookmaking operations. Siegel received $25.000 a month from Las Vegas casinos bookmaking.

In 1945 Siegel set up shop in Las Vegas. He took Sedway for a drive to “the middle of nowhere," stopped the car, and pointed to a few old buildings. Siegel then told Sedway about his plan: “Moe, we’re going to buy this hunk of land. And we’re going to build the goddamnest biggest hotel and casino you ever saw. I can see it now. ‘Ben Siegel’s Flamingo’ that’s what I’m going to call it.

(to be continued)

The Flamingo Hotel and Casino

By David Amoruso

Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel wasn’t kidding about his Flamingo. The cost of the hotel and casino was originally estimated at $1.5 million. But Siegel wanted the very best of everything. Every bathroom had its own sewer line. He ordered the best imported woods and marble. These were the post war times, and there were a lot of shortages, Siegel’s contractor couldn’t produce all the necessary building materials. As a result Siegel spent large amounts of money and bought the materials from black marketeers. These black marketeers would deliver the materials in the morning, then they would come back at night to steal it again. Siegel was losing money all across the building site. The Flamingo ended up costing $6 million.

On December 26, 1946 the Flamingo was opened. It was a disaster. Siegel had chartered planes to take celebreties from Los Angeles to Vegas, the planes couldnt take off due to bad weather, and most of the celebs didn’t show. Still several did, among them Siegel’s good friend and actor George Raft (Raft would later turn up as a manager at a London casino, he was a front man for Meyer Lansky.) The casino had a bad opening night and Siegel was getting irritated. One of the guests approached him to congratulate him on the beautiful hotel and casino. The man called Siegel “Bugsy,” Siegel immediately turned to ice and got very angry. It was known to most that Siegel didnt want to be called Bugsy. He had pistol whipped people for it, even fired bullets past the head of a man that, as ordered, was crawling around an olympic sized swimming pool.

In its two weeks in business the Flamingo hotel and casino lost $100.000 Siegel decided to close it down, and finish construction. On March 27, 1947 it reopened its doors, and eventually began making a profit. It was too late for Siegel though. Siegel had spent too much of other peoples money, and insulted too many powerful figures. On June 20, 1947 he was murdered while in his Beverly Hills mansion. A gunman fired bullets through the living room window. Siegel was hit twice in the face and twice in the chest. Alan Smiley was in the living room when Siegel was shot and said: “His right eye flew right past my face.”

Twenty minutes after the shooting Moe Sedway, Morris Rosen, and Gus Greenbaum walked into the Flamingo casino and said they had taken over. The good times for the mob had begun.

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Vegas' mayor a living link to mob days

By George McEvoy

Palm Beach Post Columnist

Saturday, December 23, 2006

Maybe he misread the message of the holiday season, or perhaps he's trying to out-Scrooge the Dickensian miser, but the mayor of Las Vegas wants to make it a crime to feed the homeless poor or allow them to rest their weary heads in his city's parks.

Oscar Goodman's domain includes only the city itself. The world-famous Las Vegas Strip, with its glitzy casino-hotels, is outside the city limits. But there are plenty of casinos in the city as well, mostly older ones. The homeless may believe they fit in more easily in the older section, or maybe they're just scared of offending the people who own the glamorous inns along the Strip. For whatever reason, they congregate in the city, turning its parks into shantytowns.

This distresses Mayor Goodman greatly. He once proposed rounding up all the homeless and putting them in an abandoned jail. City officials closed one park after one homeless man killed another during a fight.

Last July, the city made it illegal to feed the poor in parks. Homeless advocate Gail Sacco had been bringing buckets of hot soup and sandwiches. Now she could be fined up to $1,000.

After the American Civil Liberties Union challenged the ordinance, and a judge agreed that it was unconstitutional, the city fathers, including Mayor Goodman, promised to rewrite it.

Mayor Goodman has said he only wants to get the homeless to use the regular shelters he claims are available, and he accuses the squatters of breaking the law while using drugs and alcohol.

"That's intolerable to me," he has said.

The ironic aspect of that viewpoint is the fact that the mayor, according to The Associated Press, is a former mob lawyer. Where does he think the mob got its money to build all those fancy casinos? Where does he think the mob still gets a great deal of its wealth, if not from drugs?

And it was bootleg hooch, during Prohibition, that made casino executives out of a bunch of back alley thugs.

But that's the way things go in the area we used to call "Lost Wages, Nevada."

It seems that the late Mr. Dalitz had donated $1 million to a local hospital to build a wing.

What the sign didn't say was that Morris Dalitz used to be known as "Machine Gun Moe" when he was an enforcer with the Mayfield Road gang in Cleveland during Prohibition.

Later, he helped form Detroit's Purple Gang and, after running a string of illegal gambling joints in Florida and Kentucky, came to Las Vegas. In time, he became the top figure behind the Desert Inn, at that time the swankiest casino on the Strip, but now torn down.

I traveled out to Las Vegas to attend Jimmy Hoffa's farewell dinner before he left for prison. Naturally, it was held in the DI, as the Desert Inn was called by its intimates, meaning the mob.

Moe Dalitz was all over the place, shaking hands, slapping backs, very much the successful American businessman, right out of Sinclair Lewis. He was less boring when he carried a submachine gun in a violin case.

But that's what Las Vegas did. It gave the hoods the opportunity to pose as legit executives and get away with it. Guys whose pictures used to be up on post office walls received invitations to the White House. Men you wouldn't want as neighbors suddenly owned the neighborhood.

It even gave their mouthpieces, the lawyers who helped them beat the rap in hundreds of criminal cases, the chance to amass fortunes of their own.

And it allowed those lawyers, years later, to say they were shocked by the use of drugs and alcohol.

January 08, 2007

'When the Mob Ran Vegas' just the tip of Fischer's iceberg
By Jerry Fink <jerry@lasvegassun.com>
Las Vegas Sun


Sixty-three-year-old Steve Fischer has been visiting Las Vegas since he was a child, coming with his parents to stay at places like the Sands (now the Venetian) and the Sahara (still the Sahara).

The biggest change he has seen in the city - besides the obvious growth and related issues - is the attitude of the visitors.

"Back in the '50s and '60s, it was a fun place," said Fischer, a retired executive with American Express who splits time between Las Vegas and Omaha, Neb. "Back then everyone who came here was in a vacation mood. Everyone was happy. Now it's an angry place, with the traffic and the smog."

Still, Fischer is a fan of Las Vegas and something of an expert on the subject, having studied it most of his life and been a collector of Las Vegas-related items. He recently published the historical book "When the Mob Ran Vegas," which is available at most casino gift shops and through the Web site whenthemobranvegas.com.

"It took me 30 years to research and three years to write," Fischer said.

The book is an easy read, full of anecdotes about the mob history in Vegas with lots of names that anyone who knows anything about the city's history will recognize: Sam "Momo" Giancana, mob boss and boyfriend of Phyllis McGuire; mob frontman Frank "Lefty" Rosenthal, who ran the Stardust; and hit man Tony "The Ant" Spilotro.

Mentioned several times in the book is one of Fischer's heroes, the late Hank Greenspun, founder of the Las Vegas Sun who pushed for strict state control of the casino industry .

QVC, the sales channel, will feature six days' worth of Las Vegas items, which will be scheduled around the implosion of the Stardust. Fischer will be part of the six-day special, the expert who will put all of the items being sold into historical context.

Fischer has amassed a wealth of Vegas-related files over the years, enough information for an almost endless series of books. His next will be about Las Vegas showgirls of the '60s and '70s, set to be published in August. He did in-depth interviews with 49 performers.

"The average age of the girls is 70," Fischer said. "These are the gals who knew the mob guys."

April 01, 2007

TROPICANA AT 50

Three lives changed by the 'Tiffany of The Strip'
Stories
By Ed Koch
Las Vegas Sun

Photography
By Sam Morris
Las Vegas Sun




A Cuban refugee lived the American dream

TO ESCAPE CUBA IN 1961 after spending months in a concentration camp, Jose Dominguez signed over his plantation and all his belongings to Fidel Castro's Communist government.

‚"I came to Las Vegas with nothing but the clothes on my back," Dominguez said.

It was the Tropicana that provided him with the resources to live the American dream.

After 46 years as a showroom usher at the Strip resort, Dominguez, who became a U.S. citizen in the 1980s, still has a blinding hatred for Castro and a deep devotion to the Strip resort he calls his second home.

Dripping with gold and diamond jewelry and well past the standard age of retirement, the white-haired Dominguez, short and suave, works the entrance for the afternoon shows, greeting old friends and making new ones.

I love to talk to people," he says.

Dominguez used to serve drinks in the showroom, but now the customers just head over to the bar themselves. He recalls his most memorable drink order: In the 1960s from actor Sean Connery .

You know my drink and you know how to serve it," Connery said, keeping in his 007 character.

So Dominguez delivered a dry martini, shaken, not stirred.

Dominguez, a widower, father of two and grandfather of two, said he never considered working for any of the newer resorts.

This place is like family," he said, recalling how J.K. Houssels, who purchased the resort in the late 1950s, regularly ate in the employee cafeteria.

Dominguez's life didn't turn out as he anticipated as a youth.

Born into a family of lawyers, doctors and land-owning gentry, he was studying medicine at the University of Havana when Castro came to power, targeted his family as an enemy and went after its wealth.

Dominguez still so fears even the ailing Castro that he asked that his age not be printed, so the Cuban government cannot easily identify his relatives in Cuba and retaliate.

Domingu ez says he is anxious for the Trop's expansion - and the jobs it will generate for future workers.

But don't ask him to turn in his tuxedo yet.

With the help of God, I plan to stay here for years," Dominguez said.


Showgirl gets to know 'family' guy Joe Agosto, everybody's father

JAN WRIGHT ARRIVED AT THE TROPICANA IN 1975 to perform as a showgirl and animal trainer in her husband's "Folies Bergere" act, "Gene Detroy and the Marquis Chimps."

The British-born dancer, who had been a member of the London Palladium's Tiller Girls dance troupe, and Detroy had a good working relationship with the hotel's entertainment director, Joe Agosto.

"Joe wanted to be everyone's father," Wright said. "He looked after everyone like they were family."

Wright did not know just how much of a "family" guy Agosto was.

He was the Las Vegas front man for the skimming operation at the Trop that funded the Civella Kansas City Mafia family's criminal enterprise.

So that, she said, explained Agosto's peculiar habit of holding meetings poolside so the noisy pool filter would muffle the conversation.

Agosto avoided using Tropicana office or casino phones, Wright said, sensing that they might have been bugged.

"But Joe was careless and said things when he used the boy dancers' (backstage) pay phone that had been tapped," Wright said. "That's how the feds got him."

Information learned from those calls helped lead to the 1979 St. Valentine's Day raid on the Tropicana by the federal government, which produced indictments against Agosto and others, including purported mob boss Carl Civella and Tropicana casino executive Carl W. Thomas.

Agosto, whose code name in mob circles was "Caesar," became the government's key witness, helping put away Civella, Thomas and others. And it ended the mob's control of the Tropicana.

Agosto died of a heart attack in August 1983 in Kansas City.

Wright stayed at the Tropicana after the act, and her marriage, broke up.

"There comes a point as an entertainer when you get tired of all of the traveling and you want to settle down," said Wright, who said she became a U.S. citizen in 1977 but declined to give her age. "The Tropicana had been good to me, like a family, so I decided to stay."

In her 32 years at the Trop, she climbed the ranks and is now the hotel's administration services manager, overseeing records and finances.

As for the future: "I see the Tropicana building on what it already has and becoming even more of a terrific place." Will she be a part of it? "I serve at the pleasure of the president."


A blackjack dealer remembers celebrities who played at his table

SAMMY MILLAGE HAS BEEN DEALING BLACKJACK at the Tropicana since Richard Nixon was elected president.

Once, when he was tapped on the back of his shoulder - the signal for one dealer to replace another on the next hand - Millage turned around and found himself staring at Dean Martin, who was not performing at the Tropicana but was at the resort to play , and apparently deal some hands of 21 to gape-jawed gamblers.

Millage said he was thrilled to step aside for Dino, who was known among gamers as a fairly good dealer.

"I've dealt to or seen a lot of stars here over the years," Millage, 60, said. "That's why they call the Tropicana the Tiffany of the Strip."

Millage said the Trop's friendliness has cultivated many regulars.

Millage, who worked as a dealer at the Fremont and Landmark casinos before joining the Tropicana in 1972, has had chances to move on, but he has avoided the temptation .

"I figure if I am going to do the same job somewhere else, I just as well stay here because I like it here," said the father of two and grandfather of six.

And dealing to famous people who frequent the resort is always a thrill.

Among the celebrities to whom Millage says he has dealt hands are entertainers Frank Sinatra, Sammy Davis Jr., Telly Savalas and Bill Cosby, as well as former world heavyweight boxing champion Larry Holmes.

Millage, who also has dealt three-card poker, Crazy 4 and Caribbean stud table games, recalled that Cosby actually preferred to play tennis at the Trop, where tennis great Andre Agassi's father was club pro.

Savalas was an excellent tipper, Millage said, and Holmes was a happy gambler.

Millage sees a bright future for the Tropicana under new ownership.

"Nothing ever remains the same. It's time for a change," he said.

The new owners "have announced they are adding a lot more rooms. We'll be among the largest hotels again."

For a time, the Tropicana was among Las Vegas' six largest hotels.

And what about Millage's future ?

"The day I cannot find my way home, I'll retire," he said.

Made to Be Mayor
By Chuck Goudie
June 13, 2007 - Oscar Goodman once defended some of Chicago's most notorious hoodlums and is now running the city they once ran: Las Vegas.

When federal prosecutors in Chicago put 14 mobsters on trial this summer, an aspect of the case will be how the outfit once controlled criminal rackets in Las Vegas. That prospect has Las Vegas' most prominent politician somewhat skittish because he was part of that past.
In a city of lights and largess, no one shines brighter or bigger these days than Oscar Goodman, the mayor now in his third term. The seat behind his city hall desk isn't just a chair, it's actually a throne. Even the headliners billed out on The Strip haven't played the halls that King Oscar once played before becoming mayor: the halls of justice, where for years as a lawyer, he tried to keep some top Chicago hoodlums out of jail.

The Chicago mob-the outfit, which is the given name for traditional organized crime founded in Chicago almost a century ago, is an organization pioneered by Al Capone and perfected by Anthony "the Ant" Spilotro, the outfit's Las Vegas emissary into the 1980s, frequently shadowed by his lawyer, Oscar Goodman.

"From a government perspective, he killed 26 people 21 people or 19 or whatever, but when I represented him he never did a day in jail. From '72 until the time he was killed ...They created him to be much greater than the role that he was really playing on behalf of Chicago while he was here, but they made him into an everyday news item and caused him to have a reputation perhaps he didn't deserve," Goodman said.

Nor did Tony Spilotro and his brother Michael deserve this, according to Goodman: the men were buried alive in an Indiana cornfield after angry mob bosses ordered them pummeled and planted.

"It was a violent death," said Goodman. "I think it was interesting when they were filming the movie Casinoand depicting the murder of Tony and his brother, it was so rough, that even during the production of a movie, somebody broke their arm. That's how violence it was."

Oscar Goodman knows all about the brutal movie. He played a mob lawyer in the film, and Goodman reveals that, as the Spilotro murders remained unsolved for years, he was never contacted by investigators.

"I was always disappointed that nobody asked me any questions about who had done it or what was happening as far as Tony was concerned before it took place," Goodman said.

I-Team: "They didn't ask you a single question?"

Goodman: "No, not a single one. Don't you think they would've asked: Do you have any idea who might have done this?"

Despite smothering the opposition in last April's mayoral election, Goodman is not without critics.

"He's a braggadocio man. He's got an ego as big as it can be, and he's got the right job, because he's got a big mouth and he can promote [Las Vegas]," said Frank Cullotta, ex-mob hitman.

Cullotta was Tony Spilotro's major domo In Las Vegas before rolling over in 1982 to help the government prosecute outfit bosses. Cullotta and two former lawmen are authors of a new book on the Chicago mob and contend that Goodman had little to do with the mob's eventual exodus from Las Vegas.

"The Chicago Outfit is much less potent than it was years ago," said Dennis Griffin, author/former policeman.

"It is interesting that the mayor stopped it. Because before he said there was no organized crime," said Dennis Arnoldy, author/former FBI agent.

"Big corporations cleaned up this town...not Goodman," said Cullotta.

Unlike Mayor Richard M. Daley, who refuses to capitalize on Chicago's rich mob history, Goodman proudly displays outfit trinkets in his office and is turning a historic Las Vegas building into a mob museum.

"To celebrate that era, basically it's going to be telling the truth about Las Vegas. We're not going to implode any decades here...I won't whitewash our history here. We advertise as what happens here stays here, the mystique of Las Vegas. I don't want to give that up," said Goodman.

Goodman says that during the time he was representing mobsters, federal prosecutors tried to have him indicted for obstruction of justice but could never convince a grand jury that he did anything wrong. He has never been charged with anything.

Goodman says he is so well liked that a movement is underway to eliminate term limits in Las Vegas so he can continue to sit on the throne.

O.C. sheriff is denied use of law enforcement data
By Christine Hanley, Times Staff Writer
July 17, 2007



O.C. Sheriff Michael S. CaronaA law enforcement network that gathers intelligence on organized crime has cut off the Orange County Sheriff's Department because of the sheriff's association with various businessmen, including a Las Vegas strip club owner with reputed mob ties now serving time for racketeering.

Sheriff Michael S. Carona minimized the effect of the suspension, saying it would have zero influence on his department's police work and that he had never heard of the Law Enforcement Intelligence Unit until the chairman contacted him last year about the potential suspension.

Carona also downplayed his relationship with topless-bar owner Rick Rizzolo, whom the Intelligence Unit identified as one of several individuals who associate with the sheriff and "have pled guilty to or are suspected of involvement in criminal activity … including traditional organized crime activity."

"I don't know the guy. I don't associate with the guy," Carona said of Rizzolo in an interview Monday. "We're not buddies."

The intelligence network, a 51-year-old professional association that collects and shares intelligence on organized crime, terrorism and gambling, notified its membership of the decision in an internal memo issued in June. The group comprises about 250 police agencies in four countries.

The group's executive board voted April 21 to indefinitely suspend the sheriff's access to the group's "criminal intelligence information and related materials, except in cases involving imminent danger to life or property," according to a memo from general chairman Russell M. Porter, assistant director of criminal investigations for the Iowa Department of Public Safety.

"The decision comes after the executive board's review of circumstances involving the chief executive of the Orange County Sheriff's Department," Porter wrote.

Porter said the action reflected the board's concerns over "occurrences or acts detrimental to the LEIU or when an agency's membership is detrimental to LEIU objectives or policy."

It is up to individual member agencies to determine whether to continue to exchange criminal intelligence information with the Sheriff's Department, he added.

Porter and other board members did not return phone calls seeking comment.

Correspondence between the group and the O.C. Sheriff's Department shows that the executive board's review included the sheriff's association with Rizzolo. Two law enforcement officials familiar with the decision, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to comment, also said the board considered his interactions with Joseph Medawar, who was allowed to film scenes for a bogus television series about U.S. homeland security at the sheriff's highly secure emergency communications center.

Rizzolo was sentenced to a year and a day in prison in January after pleading guilty to tax evasion and racketeering charges related to allegations that he and his employees extorted money from customers with threats and violence.

Last year, the OC Weekly published photos showing Rizzolo with a drink in one hand and his other arm draped around a uniformed Carona at the upscale Ritz restaurant in Newport Beach. Rizzolo contributed the maximum $1,500 to the sheriff's 2006 campaign. The donation was later returned.

Filmmaker Medawar was sentenced in December to a year and a day in prison after admitting he swindled more than $2 million out of scores of victims who thought they were investing in a reality series about the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. The purported actress in the show was appointed as a special reserve deputy in Orange County before she too was indicted in the get-rich scheme and pleaded guilty to lying to federal agents.

Carona said the only person identified by name by the Intelligence Unit was Rizzolo. In September, Carona wrote a letter to the group's chairman acknowledging that he had met Rizzolo on several occasions, including at a campaign fundraiser, and had had his picture taken with him. But he told the group he has taken "tens of thousands of pictures" with people during his term as sheriff. He said he couldn't do a background check on all of them and that it would be illegal for him to do so.

He said he had not maintained a relationship with Rizzolo and had not known of Rizzolo's business relationships or activities. He said that once he learned of them, he returned Rizzolo's money. The sheriff noted that others, including President Bush and former state Atty. Gen. Bill Lockyer, had taken contributions from Rizzolo. Similarly, Medawar had conned a variety of politicians and other power brokers into carrying out his scam, Carona said. The sheriff said he would be happy to meet with the board to address its concerns but had not been invited to do so.

In the meantime, Carona and his top assistants said the department would still have access to all the intelligence it needs through other channels. The sheriff said he had secret clearances with the FBI, Department of Justice and other agencies that allow him access to certain types of classified information.

"This has no effect on us," he said. Assistant Sheriff Steve Bishop said the suspension was not an embarrassment for the sheriff or the department but, rather, should be considered an embarrassment for the Law Enforcement Intelligence Unit.

The unit was formed in 1956 to set standards for promoting the trust, training and communication required to carry out the lawful and ethical sharing, use and analysis of criminal intelligence among law enforcement agencies.

Los Angeles County Sheriff's Capt. Steve Johnson, who helps supervise his department's major crime bureau, said the Intelligence Unit's resources were highly valuable. He said he did not know the reasons behind the Orange County suspension. But in general, he said, when the association suspends an agency, it is "sending out a warning" that it cannot vouch for the veracity of that agency's files.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
christine.hanley@latimes.com

The Rick Rizzolo Connection
http://www.stevemiller4lasvegas.com/RickRizzolo.html

REF'S MAFIA POINT MAN
PAL HOOKED HIM UP WITH GAMBINOS
By JANA WINTER in Drexel Hill, Pa., SAMUEL GOLDSMITH in Bradenton, Fla., and CHUCK BENNETT in N.Y.
Tim Donaghy
July 28, 2007 -- A small-town gambler with a Las Vegas rap sheet is responsible for introducing disgraced NBA ref Tim Donaghy to the Gambinos, sources close to the case said yesterday.

Peter Ruggieri, who was convicted of running an illegal sports book in Las Vegas, is from Glen Mills, Pa., a short drive from where Donaghy and his other gambler buddies grew up in Philadelphia.

Sources said he and another hometown gambler, James Battista - who met Ruggieri at a local country club - introduced the pals to a New York gambler with mob connections.

Ruggieri, 38, did not return calls for comment and did not answer the door at his home in Glen Mills.

"[Ruggieri] is the big-time bookie, the one with the connections," a Donaghy family friend told The Post. "Pete isn't like the bookies around here. He won't even talk to you unless your bet is $100,000."

The friend's account was backed up another source close to the case.

Battista and Donaghy both attended Cardinal O'Hara HS in Springfield, Pa., in the 1980s. Ruggieri attended nearby Monsignor Bonner HS in Drexel Hill at the same time.

In the late 1990s, Ruggieri and Battista were virtual neighbors in Vegas, living 1½ miles apart.

Between 1996 and 1997, Ruggieri was the bagman for an il legal sports-bet ting operation in Las Vegas involv ing two well- known card sharps, according to court papers.

He was con victed of wire fraud in 2002 and ordered to pay a $2,000 fine for a scheme that took sports bets from bookies in New Jersey and New York City.


Ruggieri's attorney at the time was John Momot Jr., who represents some of Sin City's most high-profile mob figures, a law-enforcement source said.


Battista, 42, was contacted by the FBI several months ago regarding Donaghy's involvement with betting on games he officiated and providing inside information to known mobsters.

"The FBI reached out to my client many months ago," said Battista's attorney, Jack McMahon. "He intends to defend himself against any charges, if there are any."

Battista had only "minor" offenses on his record, including a gambling offense, McMahon told the Associated Press. "I know he never went to jail. It was some minor, minor offense," McMahon said.

Another of Donaghy's high school buddies, Thomas Martino, has also been questioned by the FBI.

Donaghy, 40, is expected to turn himself in at Brooklyn federal court sometime next week to answer gambling charges.

He avoided reporters yesterday, spending most of the day at his Bradenton, Fla., home.

FBI Backing Plan for Vegas Mob Museum
By KEN RITTER | Associated Press Writer
3:27 PM CST, December 10, 2007
LAS VEGAS

Las Vegas is building a museum about some of its founding fathers and most influential figures -- guys with names like Bugsy, Lefty and Lansky.

The mob museum will stand as frank acknowledgment of the major role mobsters played in developing Las Vegas into the gambling capital of America and giving the city its rakish glamour during the 1940s and '50s.

"Let's be brutally honest, warts and all. This is more than legend. It's fact," said Mayor Oscar Goodman, a former defense attorney whose clients once included mobsters Meyer Lansky and Anthony "Tony the Ant" Spilotro. "This is something that differentiates us from other cities."


The project has gained the support of the FBI and is guided by a retired FBI agent. They say they are involved because you can't tell the stories of Benjamin "Bugsy" Siegel, his banker, Lansky, casino boss Frank "Lefty" Rosenthal and others without telling the story of the lawmen who pursued them.

"This is a way to connect with the public and show the results of our work," said Dan McCarron, a spokesman for the FBI in Washington.

Ellen Knowlton, who retired in 2006 as FBI agent in charge in Las Vegas and now heads the not-for-profit museum organization, said FBI officials have offered to share photographs, transcripts of wiretaps and histories of efforts to kneecap organized crime in the 1950s, '60s and '70s.

"Despite the sort of edgy theme, this museum will be historically accurate and it will tell the true story of organized crime," Knowlton said. "The plan is to give people a kind of gritty taste of what it would have been like to be not only a person involved or affiliated with organized crime, but also what it would have been like to be in law enforcement."

Officials expect to open the museum by 2010 in a brick federal building that was the centerpiece of this dusty town of 5,100 residents when it opened in 1933. In 1950, the three-story building hosted a hearing by Tennessee Sen. Estes Kefauver's special investigating committee on the rackets.

Goodman, who showed his own willingness to play up Las Vegas' mob past by making a cameo in the 1995 Robert De Niro-Joe Pesci movie "Casino," has pushed the idea of a mob museum from the time he was elected mayor in 1999.

He brokered a deal for the city to buy the building in 2000 for $1, with the understanding it would be turned into cultural center. Officials expect the final cost, including renovations, to reach almost $50 million.

About $15 million has been raised through grants, city funds, contributions and the sale of commemorative license plates that marked Las Vegas' centennial in 2005.

It was Siegel who pioneered the transformation of this one-time desert stopover into a glittering tourist mecca, opening the $6 million Flamingo hotel on the fledgling Las Vegas Strip in 1946 with financial backing from Lansky.

The movie-star handsome Siegel was rubbed out six months later in Beverly Hills, Calif., perhaps because he angered the mob with cost overruns on the hotel.

Spilotro and Rosenthal were associates in the 1970s, when Rosenthal ran several casinos, including the Stardust. Spilotro was killed in 1986 and buried in an Indiana cornfield.

Organized crime eventually was driven out of Las Vegas in the 1970s and '80s by the FBI, local police and prosecutors, state crackdowns and casino purchases by corporate interests.

Many of these stories have been dramatized by Hollywood in such movies as "Bugsy," "The Godfather" and "Casino." But documenting mob history isn't going to be easy.

"If anybody out there finds a memo saying: `To the boys, from Meyer. Re: Bugsy. Kill him,' We'd love to have it," said Michael Green, a College of Southern Nevada history professor who is researching exhibits for the museum. "But we doubt it's there."

"Because of that, you have to do a lot of reconstructing, inferring and implying," he said. "There's a lot of winking we're going to have to do."

Green pointed to stories about Moe Dalitz, a Cleveland businessman who rescued the Desert Inn and Stardust casinos in the 1950s and '60s and built a hospital, golf courses and shopping centers.

"Was he tied to the mob or involved with the mob? Yes," Green said. "A mobster? Harder to explain."

Dennis Barrie, who directed the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland and the popular International Spy Museum in Washington, said he will design the as-yet-unnamed Las Vegas museum to show how organized crime and the fight against it shaped modern life.

"Whether it's running the casinos in Las Vegas, or controlling cigarette sales or numbers or trash collection in any city, organized crime is part of the American culture," Barrie said. "Everybody has a mob story or a brush with the mob world. Or they at least say they do."

Organizers say paying visitors might be asked to decide as they arrive which side of the law they want to be on, and then be given a story line tracing the life of a famous lawman or mobster or a street cop or numbers runner.

"Were you a hit man? Were you a prosecutor? What choices do you have to make?" Green said. "We're telling a story of things that are multisided."

Organizers also hope to have an oral-history area where visitors "can sit down in front of a camera and say, `I knew Bugsy,' or `I saw Meyer,' or whatever," he said.

It would make a visit to Las Vegas a lot more interesting. I can imagine the gambling gets old fast lol. I would definitely check out the museum if I visited Las Vegas :)

yeah the gambling does get old fast. i've been out there twice and i would rather go around visiting some of the old hotels that have ties to the good ol days(before they are all gone), and i would def go to a muesum out there. also there is a traveling exhibit called made in america(i put up a post about it). i think he might have set up shop in cali right now, but was trying to get out to vegas as well. he had it set up in little italy in nyc back in 06.

In front of father, Rizzolo called mob ‘hoodlum’
http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2008/feb/2...ed-mob-hoodlum/

Those guys who got in at beginning must have all thought they died and went to Heaven, all that money, not much law enforement attention, must have been one big party.

ye that was pretty much the standard behaviour in those days. i would have loved to experienced it first hand or known someone who could tell me stories about it.

q; apologies if its abit amature but how influential is the mob in running las vegas nowadays? im guessing not much at all, given its decay over the years, but around when did it start this contracting influence and if i am incorrect, what kind of mob is las vegas being controlled by. or if anyone knows what type of entities/individuals are running it, it be great.

thanks

for the most part they are out of it. maybe some loan sharking, gambling, book making, prostitution, and drugs(possibly). they are out of the casino's as they were all bought by legitimate corps.

maybe someone from the area or with some better knowledge can be of more info

na thats the answer i was looking for. thanks :D

if legit corporations bought them, did the money go into the hands of the existing mob owners?

my guess is that most of the monies made it back to the hands of those who had points in them. i'm not completely sure that every casino they sold they got the money for.

i'm gonna see if i can find any info about this...........cause this is a damn good question!

I think they have been out since 70's, with a few guys still active, but nowhere near the scale of early days. 70's were last harrah. Most mob activity last 20 years is more centered around having pieces of gamblers, and that is dying out too. Less mob, and a different type of gambler.

ciao


Very interesting. What exactly is a 'legit' corporation? Many 'legit' corporations my friends have millions upon millions of dollars of money invested by organized crime.

We all know the best way to 'wash' money is to put it through 'legit' corporations - this has gone on for years.

Again, i put it to you, whatever 'the heat' was, or might be, would you give up your 'investments' in Vegas? Nooooooooooooooo! We just go about it in a different manner. Just taking care of business. Legit of otherwise.

Some might say i am cynical. Me? I just a realist.

Buona fortuna.


'The King is dead. Long live the King'

when i say legit, i mean a hotel that doesn't have links to organized crime...like howard huges, steve wynn, etc. these men don't have any links to crime families. now i'm not sayin that some lcn families might have some inroads to these casinos, but the heyday has been long gone.

ciao


That is my very point. Organized crime is linked to legit corporations the world over - by dollars. Billions of them.

Organized crime has invested into major corporations the world over - quite legitimately, though perhaps with tainted money - but this does not mean that these companies are now not legit, if you follow my pattern.

A company can be quite legit in all aspect - no mob involvement etc., but you can bet your bottom dollar that there is money in there somewheres - not legit, or having been 'cleaned up'.

You cannot, I am afraid, seperate Mafia and Global business today. It is just not possible. Watching your Sony TV or sucking succulent lemons, the product may be different, but the reality is the same. Organized crime has an interest in it. Enjoy!


Buona fortuna

'The king is dead. :ong live the king'

From what I have read the mob's influence over casinos was erased in the 1980s when the last of the casinos was taken from its control. They no longer control any of the casinos. Too much money is made by those buildings so the corporations and US government protect them very well.

However that does not mean the mob doesn't have huge loansharking activities there. Extortion can continue. Drugdealing. Prostitution. Plus perhaps bet some of their illegal gotten money, and via via launder it clean.

But that is all the influence that lasts nowadays.

that's exactly what i said in here a few posts back. i do see his point, but the days of mob control over casinos is either completely over with, or it is very near extinction.



however, loan sharking, gamnling, prostitution, and drugs are still probably very much alive out there

There are/were rumors about Steve Wynn's connections to the Genovese crime family....

i guess we learn something new everyday....i haven't heard that, but thanks for bringing that up hollander :)

http://www.americanmafia.com/Feature_Articles_57.html

stupid company has that website blocked......lol

July 31, 2000

Casino Owner Steve Wynn Once Again Forced To Deny Ties To The Genovese Crime Family.
By John William Tuohy


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

John William Tuohy is a writer who lives in Washingon, D.C.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



Las Vegas Casino owner tells the supreme court he's not a front man for the mob.

In a suit that might, in future, block writers who fear a law suits, from referring to leading law enforcement agencies as information sources, Las Vegas casino Steve Wynn's lawyers denied that their client is a front man for the organized crime.

The problem began in 1982 when a Scotland Yard report was compiled on Wynn who was seeking a gaming license in Great Britain. Included in the investigative 100-page report was the statement that Wynn "has been operating under the aegis of the Genovese family since he went to Las Vegas in the 1960s."

Barricade Books put out 5,000 advertising circular to book reviewers to promote the publication of "Running Scared: The Life and Treacherous Times of Las Vegas Casino King Steve Wynn," and used words from the Scotland Yard report connecting Wynn to the mob, in the circular's.

Wynn's lawyers say that Barricade knew the Scotland Yard Report was false but he still used the information in circular's anyway.

Wynn sued Barricade Books publisher Lyle Stuart and the book's author, columnist John L. Smith, for libel, claiming "emotional distress" from having to answer questions from gaming regulators in New Jersey and Connecticut about his alleged ties to the Mafia.

In 1997, a jury in Clark County, Nevada, awarded Wynn $3.2 million for comments included in the circular. Lyle Stuart appealed the libel judgment to the State Supreme court.

The $3.2 million award against the publisher is, say his lawyers, five times his net worth and has put him in bankruptcy.

Before the trial in Clark County began, Smith, the books author, was dropped from the case by a District Judge and Wynn appealed that decision to the Supreme Court, as well.

Smith's lawyer, JoNell Thomas, told the court there was no basis for Wynn having any claim against Smith since Smith had nothing to do with the advertisement "He did not write it. He did not edit it. There can be no finding of liability."

Barricade's lawyers maintained that Scotland Yard is one of the leading law enforcement agencies in the world and writers should be able to refer to its reports without being sued.

However, Wynn's lawyers countered that the Scotland Yard resort was not official or publicly released and claimed that it was withdrawn before British gaming regulators could see it.

State Supreme Court Chief Justice Bob Rose questioned whether jurors in the Clark County trial had been given proper instructions in the case. The jurors had been instructed that to prove malice in a libel case, a defendant must know what he writes was false or had "doubts" about its accuracy.

Rose said that the letter of the law reads that the rule requires "seriou s doubts" about accuracy of a statement. The single word omission is expected to lead to a decision for Stuart and Barricade Books.

Before the hearing began, Rose announced all seven justices have received, at some point in their careers, campaign contributions from Wynn's companies, and that he did not believe that disqualifies them from participating in the case.

Wynn has appeared before the Nevada Gaming Commission this month for licensing as the new owner of the $270 million Desert Inn. At that hearing, Wynn told the Commission that he intends to tear down the Desert Inn as it exists today and replace it with a 6,000-room twin-tower luxury hotel and gaming complex.

The commission granted Wynn an unrestricted gaming license and approved his $270 million purchase of the Desert Inn.

There was no mention of Asian or Caribbean gambling junkets during the trial in Clark County.

Mr. Tuohy can be reached at MobStudy@aol.com

Oops, indeed. Well I totally agree with your view ;)

thanks for copying that link for me. it sucks because my company is blocking all the good websites. if for some reason you don't see me on here for a long period of time, then you'll know why.

ciao

Well, the Steve Wynn 'story' underlines my point, and there is a great deal of this on the net which makes interesting reading.

Of course Steve's is only an alleged involvement - but we know how mud sticks and he is having a hard time shaking it off - although the authorities are, of course, continuing to stand behind him.

Anyone else about to 'come out'.


'The king is dead. Long live the king'








'The king is dead. Long live the king'.

well since there is no hard-evidence that he is connected, what can anyone do. from the looks of it, its just a rumor. then again, all fronts are supposed to deny allegations. i guess until hard proof is put out there i tend to feel that he never had any ties to the genovese

i watched a really good doco on the national geographic channel tonight called 'underworld' which told the story of how the mob moved into Vegas and their fall. brilliant, i recomend you guys to watch it if you get the chance.

only thing that disappointed me was their focus specifically on the chicago Outfit's involvement. surely they werent the only family to operate in Vegas? were they?

no, they def weren't the only family out there. i think most if not all had points in the casino's out there. i think chicago was mentioned the most because they had a piece of many casino's out there.

i'm sure someone could find out what casino's belonged to what families.

http://www.carpenoctem.tv/mafia/vegas.html