Audiobook6 hours
The Battle For Las Vegas
Written by Dennis N. Griffin
Narrated by Michael Taylor
Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
4/5
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About this audiobook
In the 1970s and thru the mid-1980s, the Chicago Outfit was the dominant organized crime family in Las Vegas, with business interests in several casinos. During those years the Outfit and its colleagues in Kansas City, Milwaukee, and Cleveland were using Sin City as a cash cow. Commonly referred to as the “skim,” unreported revenue from Outfit-controlled casinos was making its way out of Vegas by the bag full and ending up in the coffers of the crime bosses in those four locations. The skim involved large amounts of money. The operation had to be properly set up and well managed to ensure a smooth cash flow. To accomplish that goal, the gangsters brought in a front man with no criminal record to purchase several casinos. Allen R. Glick, doing business as the Argent Corporation (Allen R. Glick Enterprises) purchased the Stardust, Fremont, Hacienda, and Marina. They next installed Frank “Lefty” Rosenthal as their inside man, and the real boss of the casino operations. Rosenthal was a Chicago native and considered to be a genius when it came to odds-making and sports betting. Under Lefty’s supervision the casino count rooms were accessible to mob.
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Reviews for The Battle For Las Vegas
Rating: 4.051020371428571 out of 5 stars
4/5
49 ratings4 reviews
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Decent overview of the Mafias hold on 1970s Las Vegas. It covers a lot of the events being the Scorcese film Casino. The rise and fall of various mob figures, the book also features the cops that bought them down.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5From approximately 1970 to the mid 1980's the Chicago Mob dominated organized crime on the :as Vegas strip. Tony Spilotro, while not the real head of the organization in Vegas, he acted like it and became known as the "King of the Strip." Federal & local law enforcement wanted to clean up the the city and remove the Mob from having anything to do with casinos and gambling. Eventually, while they could never put Spilotro away, his high profile and notoriety made the Chicago bosses nervous and they had him killedThe author tells the story from the viewpoint of the FBI agents and local detectives most of whom he interviewed. He also relied on Las Vegas newspaper files and the memories of TV and newspaper reporters who lived through the period. He even interviewed some of the mobsters plus the son of Tony Spilotro who gave a completely different picture of his father from the one everyone else felt to be true. A very entertaining volume especially when one reads it while visiting Vegas as I did.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Really enjoyed learning about the history of Las Vegas. The mob killings were kinda tough to stomach and got rather confusing, but overall the author did a good job sorting it out. I still don't understand all the mob relations but this book is worth reading for the early to mid history of Vegas. Excellent narrator
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A combination Goodfellas and Casino, this book also adds in the law enforcement part of the story. Interesting, but hard to believe it could be true. However, you need only know that that scumbag Oscar Goodman managed to be Las Vegas's "happiest mayor in the world" indefinitely, using family members a proxies, to realize the sleaze was real and continues.