The Battle for Las Vegas: The Law vs. The Mob Read Online Free PDF Page B

man as the gambling establishments’ owner and appointing Lefty Rosenthal to manage the properties and keep an eye on things. This ensured that the casino count rooms could be accessed and cash removed before ever being recorded as revenue.
    Having businessmen in place was great in theory, but there was a lot of money involved and Las Vegas was growing by leaps and bounds. What if someone tried to skim the skim or otherwise rocked the boat?
    To protect its interests from such problems, the Outfit needed someone on the scene with special talents, someone whose reputation served to discourage anyone from pilfering or causing other difficulties. And if intimidation wasn’t enough, it had to be someone who wouldn’t hesitate to take any action necessary to resolve the situation.
    There was no need to recruit for the position; one of the Outfit’s current members fit the criteria perfectly. Tony Spilotro was on his way to Sin City.

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    Mob-Run Las Vegas
    T he year was 1971. Don McLean’s American Pie and Ike and Tina Turner’s Proud Mary appeared on the pop music charts. After ten years there, American soldiers were still fighting and dying in Vietnam.
    In Clark County, Nevada, the population had reached 275,000. Local law enforcement in the city of Las Vegas and unincorporated Clark County was the responsibility of two separate agencies. The Las Vegas Police Department handled the city. Everything else, including the Strip, came under the jurisdiction of the Clark County Sheriff’s Department.
    The gambling and tourism industries were flourishing. In the gaming arena, a milestone occurred when the Silver Slipper on the Strip and the Union Plaza downtown became the first casinos to hire female card dealers. Top entertainers appeared in casino showrooms and lounges. More than seven million tourists spent some time, and a lot of money, in the desert oasis.
    Just as the gambling and entertainment drew the tourists, the money attracted the criminal element. Organized-crime families across the country considered Vegas an open city. Each of them was welcome to set up business there and many did. The various mobs exercised hidden ownership and control over several of the major casinos, most of which had been built with financing from the Teamster Pension Fund. The dominant group, however, hailed from Chicago.
    Las Vegas locals and long-time visitors often speculate on what it was like to work in the casino business during those days. The following stories provide a little background on the way business was conducted back then. They come from three former casino insiders, all of whom were in supervisory or managerial positions and rubbed elbows with the wiseguys on a regular basis. Each man relates how his particular employer dealt with specific situations. To protect their identities, they’re referred to here as Mario, Mickey, and Sammy.
    The Insult
    This incident took place in the late ’60s, in the Crown Room of the International Hotel (now the Las Vegas Hilton).
    “It was about three in the morning and another guy and I stopped in the Crown Room with our dates for a drink,” Mario began. “I’m not going to name the other guy. But he was a real heavyweight in the casino business and his first name had a strong military ring to it.
    “Anyway, there was a band from San Francisco on stage. They were rising stars and were being billed as the next coming of the Beatles. I don’t know if it was because of booze or drugs, but this one guy turned out to be a real jerk. He looked at our table and said over the mike to my buddy, ‘What’s a bald old man like you doing with a pretty girl like her?’
    “We let the crack slide, but the idiot wouldn’t drop it. After a couple more wisecracks, my friend got up and made a call on a house phone. The president of the International lived in a suite at the hotel. Within a couple of minutes he showed up wearing pajamas covered by an overcoat. He went right to the stage and ordered the