From Left to Right: Teresa Fertitta, Lorenzo Fertitta, Anne Stella White and Dana White
"Aren't you afraid you're gonna get whacked?"
This is a question I used to get asked all the time. Most people who found out what I was doing with this site thought that prospect was a natural occupational hazard of covering the Fertittas and their involvement in intentionally bankrupting Xyience.
The reality was I never got a single threatening phone call and never felt like there was a real target on my back. However, I did always take precautions to make sure the Fertittas would never find out where I lived when I was stuck in Las Vegas for two years fighting their attempts to profit off their destruction of Xyience. This involved some creative evasive measures. Exiting the courthouse and getting home without a tail each time I appeared against them was an adventure in itself.
Why was I so confident nothing horrible would happen to me? The regulated nature of the casino industry requires near spotless records to be maintained by all license applicants and license holders. The Fertittas would not risk injuring me or killing me and having it even appear to be linked to them. Their empire would be at stake if they gave my reports credence by making me disappear. If they maintained any obvious illicit relationships with anyone connected to organized crime, they could lose their casino licenses. So, even the most inconsequential ties to "the Mob" would have to be kept very close to their vests and top secret to avoid the appearance of impropriety.
So, what does any of this have to do with Dana White and his wife getting in a slap fighting spat in Mexico while drunk and emotional? Bear with me. It's a fairly long story that starts with a yearbook photo I acquired of Anne Stella from when she was at Bishop Gorman High School in Las Vegas:
The photo above links to my Pinterest account where I also have pictures of Dana White and Lorenzo Fertitta from their common years at Bishop Gorman. All these years after I connected with a Bishop Gorman classmate who sent me these pictures, the story has finally come full circle.
The Bishop Gorman nexus perhaps explains everything about the way the UFC operates as a business today. It is so much more relevant now than it was back then, because I have made a new discovery from a 7-year-old interview I conducted with June White, Dana White's mother (Starting at the 1:11 mark). June and I covered a very wide range of topics, but a recent review of that audio (start at the 1 hour and 50 minute mark) uncovered a crucial detail I neglected to follow up on until this past week. It relates directly to who Anne Stella White really is and reveals a perfectly good reason why all the alleged affairs Dana White's been implicated in never resulted in a divorce. It's not just because they've known each other since they were 12.
June White (L) and her son Dana White (R)
The Real Anne Stella White Story and Why We Don't Know It Already
I specifically discussed the concept of "UFC nut-huggers" with Dana White's mother. If you're not familiar with the term, it refers to people who will never utter a bad word about the premiere MMA organization. On top of that, some of them are actually paid to post all kinds of complimentary stuff on social media about Dana, UFC business, UFC fighters and UFC events. I'm not talking about just publicists, either. Some paid posters are even encouraged to verbally squabble with doubters and detractors of the organization. I saw it firsthand while posting links to content here at Sherdog and on other mixed martial arts forums. June White successfully sued over one particular woman linked to her son who trolled her viciously online after June's book went public. June even informed me that my book on representing yourself in court helped her out in some key areas.
So it did not surprise me one bit when Dana White's most recent scandal had more people defending him than demanding his resignation. He even had loyal UFC fighters standing up for their boss.
"She hit him first" was the most common refrain. She threatened the reign of their king, so the spin had to be that this was all her fault. It's as if these fighters, fans and devoted UFC media only watched the first part of the video where Anne slapped Dana and Dana slapped her back once. I don't think most of these "nut-huggers" bothered to acknowledge the second and third slap from Dana. It appeared something was thrown at Dana's head to ultimately stop his continued assault after that. Much of the final moments were blurred by darkness and the entire violent scene blending into the crowd.
You know what else is in the dark? Anne Stella's background. Here are a couple of articles that claim to tell you everything you might want to know about the wife of "The Baldfather:"
It appears that there are a lot of unknowns about Anne and her family. She's kept her past top secret and avoids the public eye like the plague. June White knew the real reason why she had to do that. She told me 7 years ago that Dana's father-in-law was connected to the Chicago mob. For some reason I never followed up on that tip until a week ago when the Mexican slap-off became a viral story.
This passage from a lengthy article explains the Stardust skim from an insider perspective:
"Johnny Rosselli later named other Stardust “supervisors” brought in for good measure: “[Sam Giancana] sent Al Sachs and Bobby Stella to help [Drew]. Dalitz’s got Yale Cohen to watch his end. But Sam’s got a sleeper in there, Phil Ponti, a made guy from Chicago. A real sharp operator.”
When the Stardust finally opened for business on July 2, 1958, it proved well worth the effort. After the grand opening, attended by guests of honor then senator and future president Lyndon Baines Johnson and his trusty sidekick Bobby Baker, the money began arriving in Chicago almost faster than it could be counted. “They’re skimming the shit out of that joint,” Rosselli later told Fratianno. “You have no idea how much cash goes through that counting room every day. You, your family, your uncles and cousins, all your relatives could live the rest of their lives in luxury with just what they pull out of there in a month. Jimmy, I’ve never seen so much money.” Coming from a man who had lived through the phenomenal profits of the bootlegging era, this speaks volumes about the lure of Las Vegas.
The last part of that snippet above is ironic considering the fact that the Fertitta brothers lived their entire lives in luxury thanks to their father's casino industry legacy. It's certain that Frank Fertitta Junior did not just cross paths a few times over the years with Bobby Stella. Fertitta and Stella were intimately involved in the casino skimming efforts popularized in the movie "Casino" starring Robert Deniro and Joe Pesci. Fertitta's Wikipedia page explains:
"...he [Fertitta] worked as a dealer, pit boss, baccarat manager and general manager at properties including the Stardust; Tropicana, Circus Circus, Sahara and the Fremont in downtown Las Vegas."
Again, an obituary tells the hidden story behind the very close relationship between the Stella and Fertitta families. The "Memories and Condolences" section of Frank Junior's "Legacy" page contains the following entry left by Robert and Roberta Stella:
"Our thoughts and prayers are with Mrs. Fertitta and her devoted family always. You are all very special to us."
Mafia Mentality Permeates Dana White's UFC Management Style
Restrictive contracts, rewarding extreme employee loyalty and routine intimidation tactics utilized by Dana White over the years in his role as UFC President now make so much more sense. They call him "the boss" for a reason. You have to "put on a show" to make it in the UFC long term. In other words, as a mob boss would say, "You've gotta be a good earner." You have to be the kind of fighter that puts eyeballs on the brand and asses in the seats if you want to get Dana's admiration and a good return on your investment in training.
Organized crime has always been hovering in the background for the entirety of White's reign over what is widely considered the most powerful mixed martial arts league on the planet. It makes the James Krause betting scandal seem tame now in comparison. I interviewed Krause in 2016 for a now-defunct podcast. He was one of the few outspoken fighters involved in the UFC, but only because he always knew he had to diversify his income.
Another fighter who graced the Octagon more than a few times joined our podcast back in 2010. It was just before what turned out to be his last fight in the UFC, which he lost by knockout to Brad Tavares. "The New York Badass" Phil Baroni was involved in an even more horrific domestic violence incident in Mexico recently. Baroni allegedly murdered his girlfriend after she confessed to cheating on him with another man.
Baroni, known for his abrasive attitude and balls to the wall fighting style, was on his absolute best behavior during our chat. I asked him one last question about Dana White's rule over the UFC when we talked back then." It's his money, it's his show and he's the boss," Baroni said.
Listen to his answers to my last two questions for Baroni by following the link below.
We also can't neglect to mention the double standard involved in the "slap heard around the world." The "do as I say not as I do" mantra fits the scenario perfectly. White has thrown people out of the UFC for getting wrapped up in incidents of domestic violence. Yet, his own example of the same behavior is treated much differently. There has been no formal punishment at all despite White admitting publicly he has no excuse for his actions.
There's no doubt in my mind that this debacle is something Dana White will effortlessly bounce back from. The organizational underboss has all the job security a guy could want due to his popularity and pull. However, things might have been drastically different if his father-in-law was still alive when Dana slapped Bobby Stella's beloved daughter down in a drunken rage. Who knows what Anne's dear old dad would have done in this situation if he was still walking among us. I imagine the penance Dana would have to pay in that case would have been much harsher. Instead, look for this news story to drop off the radar and fade into oblivion while Dana continues with "business as usual."
"You wanna pull off a brilliant murder, you gotta act like it's an accident. If you do it right, you ain't even gotta be there when it goes down." Jamie Foxx as Dean Jones in Horrible Bosses (2011)
EDITOR'S NOTE: It may be helpful for readers to review a few of our prior reports here, here, and here in order to better understand the history leading up to the events described in this article.
By: Rich Bergeron
More than 20 years ago, on the afternoon of November 4th, 1993, Carl Wesley Thomas died after his 1992 Suburban crashed on a gravel-lined stretch of Plush road in Frenchglen, Oregon. According to the official police report (for the full document click on these links to pages 1, 2, and 3), the investigation of the scene indicated the vehicle swerved to the left first, with the two left-side tires leaving the road briefly.
Upon swerving back onto the road, Thomas apparently paid dearly for not wearing his seat belt. He was ejected from the vehicle as it rolled over, crushing him underneath it. The report goes on to state that the vehicle rolled again and wound up in a ditch at the side of the road. Thomas was discovered face-down on the road, some 36 feet from where the Suburban ultimately came to rest.
The Harney County Sherriff's Office dispatched Officer F.H. Hickey, Jr. to the scene. His report of the accident explained, "The victim received multiple fractures of the right leg, a flailed chest, and head injuries and was pronounced dead at the scene at 6:15 PM."
Whatever Hickey observed that did not end up in the report may forever remain a mystery, because the officer died of a heart attack in 1995.
The Sheriff at the time was Dave Glerup, who still holds the position today. I spoke to Glerup last October, just a few weeks shy of the 20th anniversary of the fateful crash. He explained that the scene of the rollover was a rural, remote road which experienced "lots of accidents of this type." He added that the conditions were "kind of treacherous," especially for anyone who was driving while intoxicated.
Officer Hickey's report also indicated that a half-ounce of cocaine was found on Thomas along with an empty baggie and a short straw, discovered in his pocket only after the body went to a local funeral home. The records Sheriff Glerup sent me included a Blood Alcohol Report on Thomas from the State Medical Examiner, which came back negative for alcohol. To the sheriff's knowledge, there was never any testing done to determine whether Thomas had any other drugs in his system at the time of the crash.
Despite inferences of foul play suggested to him over the years, Sheriff Glerup remains convinced that the cause of death should be classified as accidental. "It's hard to believe this could be anything but an accident," he explained. "I can't picture a homicide where the vehicle actually rolls over him like that."
Throughout the decades since the incident, rampant speculation still points to the case as a possible homicide. Adding to the suspicious circumstances involved in the crash is the fact that, just prior to his death, Thomas agreed to provide testimony at a very important meeting with Missouri Gaming officials regarding their inquiry into whether or not they should grant a gaming license to Station Casinos. Just before his death Thomas also reportedly met with Station Casinos officials to discuss his summons to Missouri, and that meeting most likely included Frank Fertitta, Jr. offering counsel to his longtime friend and associate. The crash happened on his trip back to Oregon from the Vegas sitdown, and it guaranteed Thomas would never testify in Missouri. The Fertittas were able to get their Station Casinos license after all with the dead man telling no tales.
There was only one condition put on the final approval: Frank Junior could not be part of the Missouri operations of the company. Frank's eldest son Frank Fertitta III, AKA "Frankie Three Sticks," ended up having to hold the reins there in Missouri until the state implicated the company in multiple scandalous incidents detailed further here. Missouri revoked their license and forced Station Casinos to sell their Missouri properties and go back to Vegas where Frank III also eventually had to take over due to his father's questionable past.
It's a long story, but it's safe to say Station Casinos would benefit tremendously from the death of Carl Thomas. Though that doesn't make it a sure thing that the crash was somehow orchestrated or caused by an unknown suspect connected to the Fertittas, the family collected a unique type of figurative "insurance" after the "accident."
To put things in perspective, Thomas earned a permanent ban from all Nevada casinos in 1990 after being implicated in the massive skimming operation popularized in the 1995 movie Casino, starring Robert DeNiro and Joe Pesci. Frank Junior himself was on the fringe of that scandal, and the prevailing Las Vegas legend has Frank taking over Thomas' co-ownership of what later became the first Station Casino property for a lump sum of one single dollar. The forfeiture of his ownership interest reportedly came just before Thomas went to prison for what was supposed to be a 15-year stretch. Thomas served only two of those years according to a report of his death published in the Orlando Sentinel, thanks only to his willingness to cooperate with authorities.
Frank Junior had connections to multiple casinos in Las Vegas during the heydey of Mafia skimming there. Between his departure from Texas in 1960 and his purchase of "The Casino" with Carl Thomas in 1976, Fertitta went from bellboy to dealer to pit boss to Baccarat manager to general manager at properties including: The Stardust, The Tropicana, The Sahara, Circus Circus, and ultimately The Fremont. "The Casino" later became "The Bingo Palace" which would morph further into Palace Station in 1983, launching what would become a vast "locals casino" empire rivaled only by the Boyd Corporation founded by Sam Boyd. To this day, Station Casinos and Boyd compete as the leaders of this market catering to local Las Vegas residents and casino workers.
The jury is still out on how Frank Junior avoided prosecution in the skimming investigations, especially since FBI wiretaps caught him on tape talking about "excess cash" and other veiled references to the skimming repeatedly. A security agent named Harry McBride, who worked under Thomas at the time, also told authorities that there was a "Frank" involved in perpetrating the skimming operation at the Fremont Hotel and Casino. McBride also cooperated with investigators who ultimately turned Thomas as well. McBride testified in a U.S. District Court Case against five members of the skimming ring in 1985.
There are no official records I know of regarding any testimony or cooperation on the case offered by Fertitta himself, but I did find one court document in which a name of a witness was redacted, and the person described sounded like Fertitta. My personal theory is that Frank was a secret witness in exchange for immunity from prosecution. Rather than testify in open court, he could have provided background information that helped further the investigation. After all, that might explain why David Helfrey, the chief prosecutor in the 1985 trial cited above, later went to work for Station Casinos in Missouri. If Frank Junior being a snitch sounds too far fetched, consider the fact that Frank "Lefty" Rosenthal (played by Robert DeNiro in Casino) died before the fact that he was a government informant leaked out.
Another possibility is that Carl Thomas himself could have requested Fertitta be left alone in exchange for his cooperation. Thomas switched sides during the same 1985 trial in which McBride testified. He obviously had some very incriminating and useful evidence for federal prosecutors about all the players, but he certainly could have left Fertitta out of any information he volunteered. The only other alternative explanation for Fertitta avoiding jail time is that he was an extremely lucky man.
For more on the investigations into Mob-influenced Vegas skimming at the time, check out this Dennis Griffin blog, which is the first of three chapters on the whole operation. Like most organized crime schemes, the whole enterprise turned out to be very sophisticated. The movie based on the true events is a bit loose with the facts, and it's really only half the story.
Harry McBride would later resurface during a 4-year probe of Frank Junior by the Nevada State Gaming Control Board in the lat 80s. If McBride agreed to testify before the Control Board, it could prove that Fertitta lied about his role in the Argent skimming operation when he applied for his gaming license. Thanks in part to McBride's outright animosity toward a commission member, the vast political connections cultivated by Frank Junior, and also possibly the lack of any criminal penalty for not taking the stand, McBride declined to cooperate with the board. He reportedly also did not think any good would come of him testifying.
The final decision on the matter came down to a 2-1 vote to take no action against Frank Junior. Just a few years later, in 1993 (the same year Carl Thomas died), Frank Junior passed the empire to his sons Frank III and Lorenzo. Despite Frank Junior giving up official control of Station Casinos, he spent a great deal of time at the very same property he named "The Casino" when he bought it with Carl Thomas in 1976. Though he was no longer officially in charge, workers at Palace Station would often run into Frank Junior making his rounds or eating lunch there right up until his tragic death on the operating table during a heart procedure in late August of 2009.
Carl Thomas died a tragic, yet convenient death for a Las Vegas family that later saw their power and influence grow exponentially. Even a pre-planned bankruptcy of the whole Station Casinos chain didn't stop the Fertittas from reigning supreme in the locals market and taking a once little known fight league from barbaric side-show to mainstream attraction. Through it all, Lorenzo and Frank III heeded the example of their dearly departed father. Like Frank Junior--who was a prolific political donor in his day--they always grease the wheels whenever and wherever possible. Both Democrats and Republicans benefit from that family tradition, and if paying off the politicos isn't enough to keep their corrupt actions from being shut down, they also continue to keep up their father's habit of buying a ton of advertising in the local papers to keep mainstream reporters from writing too much about their worst transgressions.
Beyond Las Vegas, the Fertittas also have contracts with various Indian-run casinos to manage casino complexes across the country. The Fertittas also do consulting work for casinos and stand at the forefront of the online gaming movement. This quiet expansion is nothing new, which is likely why the Harney County Sheriff's Office received requests for the records of the Carl Thomas crash from the Missouri Gaming Commission and the Indiana State Police Gaming Enforcement Section in 1994. Oddly enough, Nevada gaming officials have never requested accident report copies according to Sheriff Glerup.
My own investigation of the records leaves more questions than answers. The first question, and perhaps the most important one is: what caused Thomas to swerve when the crash initiated? Even the most comprehensive forensic examination with all the technology we have even today might run into a dead end trying to answer that one. The fact that the crash happened on a gravel road might mean that any tracks of another vehicle that was possibly involved might not be detected by investigators. Another unanswered question is why was there no testing for drugs when Thomas had cocaine in his pocket at the time of his death? Also, how often are passengers ejected from a vehicle that then rolls over them? Though Sheriff Glerup concludes the ejection and rollover makes it most likely the cause of death was accidental, I really don't understand that reasoning.
If the straw and the cocaine were both in his pocket at the time of the crash, it seems obvious to me that Thomas wasn't doing the cocaine at the moment of the initial swerve. So, that can't be the cause. If there was any amount of cocaine in his system, it also seems highly unlikely he fell asleep at the wheel. The only valid explanation in my humble opinion is that he was trying not to hit an animal crossing the road (accident), or another person and/or vehicle was responsible (murder or vehicular manslaughter). Since the area was so remote, there would be no witnesses, and law enforcement would take considerable time to arrive on the scene.
Rather than pin this down as an accident, I consider this a cold case that should be classified as unsolved with the official cause of death deemed undetermined. Unfortunately for all who wish to know the full truth, this is one case that will never be re-opened. There's absolutely no possible way of finding out exactly what happened, which makes Jamie Foxx's line at the top of this story so relevant to the situation. If it was murder, it was executed flawlessly. If it was actually an accident, there's still not enough evidence to conclude what really caused the rollover. It's a perfect storm of suspicious, but easily explained away facts that could support either side of the debate. Regardless of how he died, though, without Carl Thomas helping Frank Junior get his start, the Fertitta empire might not exist today. In the same breath, it must be said the death of Thomas also helped guarantee the continuation of that empire that might have been stopped in its tracks if Thomas told the truth in front of those Missouri gaming officials.
Those who dismiss the conspiracy theories would point to Thomas not implicating Fertitta when it counted back in 1985. Why would he bother to throw Frank Junior under the bus in front of a gaming commission that didn't have the power to throw him in jail for a long time if he didn't cooperate? Doubters would also point out that Fertitta wouldn't have a formal meeting with Thomas if he knew he was going to have him killed on the trip home. The very fact that at least two gaming authorities wanted to see the crash report proves that even the slightest possible inference of a criminal deed sheds a bad light on any gaming license candidate. Why would Frank Junior risk the suspicion that would surely fall on him? I can only surmise that if it was murder, Frank Junior might not be the one who ordered it. If he was running the Fremont skim for the Kansas City mob as the evidence shows, he could have also expanded to Missouri to appease the next generation of the same Kansas City outfit after the original skim bosses went down.
A murder for hire operation of this scope and magnitude, leaving no trace of evidence of a homicide, seems more like the work of a trained and experienced killer used to working in the shadows of the underworld. The hit could have been ordered by someone else deep within the organization who stood to benefit from Station Casinos getting a Missouri license, if indeed it was a sophisticated hit. Then again, who had more to gain than Frank and his family? Therefore, you can't forget the words of another "Lefty" from another movie based on a true story. I'm talking about Al Pacino's character in Donnie Brasco. "When they send for you," Lefty said, "You go in alive, you come out dead, and it's your best friend that does it."
Regardless of the true circumstances surrounding the Carl Thomas crash, it is a mystery that will follow the Fertitta family for eternity. The ghost of Carl Thomas will haunt the family legacy as long as the facts as we know them are passed down from one generation to the next. The cloud of suspicion will never go away even if speculation of any current mob connections to the Fertittas is unfounded. The fact is, the physical Mafia ties may be long gone, but the organized crime mentality still exists thanks to what Frank Junior passed down to his sons. Everything they do may technically be "legal," but there's a good chunk of activity that could be labeled very close to crossing the line into criminal behavior. Even if you can't call it criminal, you can certainly call it corrupt and underhanded. Go back through their history, and you will find one deftly avoided major scandal after another. From Argent to USA Capital to the orchestrated Station Casinos and Xyience bankruptcies to the dirty dealings of Zuffa over the years, it's all a matter of complicating and obfuscating things just enough to avoid serious lawsuits and/or criminal prosecution. It may not be the textbook definition of "crime," but it's definitely organized.
CLICK ON THE PICTURE BELOW TO READ THE "BEHIND THE MUSIC" OF THE UFC'S FERTITTA FAMILY DATING BACK TO THE FAMILY'S MAFIA ROOTS IN TEXAS. Help us get to 3,000 reads!!!
Taking A Moment To Look Back In Order To Prepare For The Road Ahead.
By: Rich Bergeron
Recent developments in the Xyience, Incorporated scandal triggered a renewed interest in the above-linked story that I posted on The Bleacher Report Web-site. A commenter on This Story at FightOpinion.Com about the recent Xyience scandal's resurgence says it all about the public's ignorance of the semi-secret Fertitta Family history:
"If Zuffa got caught as a shadow organization for the Gambino family or something, the press would be running each other off roads trying to be the first to make it to ambush Dana and the Fertitas for interviews. But a company doing simple corporate shadiness is boring."
Another commenter pointed the above user to my story about the real "family" history.
The fact is, all of these back room business deals surrounding Xyience and Station Casinos are so complicated and convoluted that nobody really wants to examine them under a microscope but the real legal experts. I had to examine these deals out of sheer necessity after I was wrongfully sued by Xyience for writing the truth about the shady activities going on there when my reports began. Fortunately for the shareholders of the company, I never gave up. Now the estate's liquidation trustee has a legal team working on dozens of complaints to return millions to the estate that was stolen through multiple streams of abuse and financial fraud. Fertitta Enterprises is tied to much of the alleged tampering with the bankruptcy. Based on what I know, these civil allegations could be only the beginning.
Eventually the whole MMA fan base that follows the UFC will be the ones looking back at these deals out of necessity to find out what went wrong and when. This is not the kind of ho-hum news that fades away with time. It only gets increasingly worse, and one day it will be time for the Fertittas to pay the piper. How much the UFC suffers as a result is up for debate, but the argument that it won't suffer is far-fetched.
The mainstream media will eventually take notice, and the Fertitta family piggy bank will eventually be drained by voluminous legal fees as they fight banks and Boyd Casinos in Vegas to retain a hold on the Station Casinos empire Frank Jr. built on a dollar and a dream. Fertitta Enterprises will take a big hit on Xyience if the trustee's case is successful in pinning the blame on that entity for initiating the BK on false pretenses and screwing the shareholders and creditors in the process.
Vegas itself appears to be under extreme stress lately due to the financial mess created by overzealous casino barons who outspent themselves and left unfinished projects languishing as a result. It is one of the worst areas hit by the housing market slump, and it is one of the most troublesome areas of the country when it comes to the homeless population. Recent media reports out of Vegas included an armored car robbery at Station Casinos and a shooting at the same federal courthouse where the Xyience bankruptcy is going on (that happened today). This is a distressed community, and it's starting to show. People are starting to become more brazen and unpredictable in their desperation.
These are the negative forces and issues brought to light by financial fraud and abuse of power. Much like the Bernie Madoff scenario had been handed to the SEC on a silver platter ten years before it really went up in smoke, the Vegas landscape also includes culprits who should have been caught a long time ago. Instead, the wheels they greased protected them from all harm. People develop feelings of being powerless because the upper crust continues to steal and get away with it and destroy lives in the process. Eventually their rage will boil over, and they will eventually be inspired to fight back. They will steal themselves, like the Station robbers. They will destroy lives themselves out of frustration, like the courthouse shooter. Those who take such measures may be few and far between at first, but as the crisis worsens and widens the population of people wandering off the reservation will grow.
The latest generation unfortunately seems to care more about what their favorite Hollywood star is writing on Twitter these days than they do about these deep, mysterious scandals in sports. The Call of Duty used to be more than a popular video game to the youth in this country. We've eroded into a do-nothing society when it comes to really trying to join together to fix the most egregious evils we see all around us. Most of us stand still and devote our lives to meaningless tasks and our jobs as cogs in the machine. Few step up and try to challenge the status quo. When people do fight back and get shut down, others cower behind them with no reason to try for a different result. We become sheeple, and the government officials (with the help of all the Capitalist fat cats who feed them) can shove whatever they want down our throats with the same old-fashioned pomp and circumstance as they've always operated with.
I was always taught to look deeper. Ask questions. Search for the truth. I'm glad I chose a battle such as the Xyience situation to get entrenched in, though the process has been painful and stressful to no end. I have no regrets, and I'm confident everything will work out in my favor when this case is in the history books. The dramatic effect this case has had in my life will translate beautifully to a book on the whole fiasco from start to finish. The legal victory in the long run will allow me a real-life model to show others how to embrace their own cases as their own attorneys and possibly win their own fights by following my example. That's all I really hope for.
It might not happen overnight, but the people's revolution is afoot and building momentum. If we don't stop cowering in the face of conglomerate corporate evil and face down our fears now, we'll simply be overtaken by the great wave of corruption that's destroyed this country.
...after Carl Thomas dies in a mysterious single car accident, everything still goes bad for Frank Jr. and his heir Frank III.
Part Three in a Four-Part Fertitta Family History.
By: Rich Bergeron
Lorenzo and Frank Fertitta III, with father Frank Jr.’s help and counsel, built Station Casinos up from a single off the strip hotspot in Las Vegas into an economic empire other casino barons envied. The empire went public and back to private in the blink of an eye and now stands to face bankruptcy if something drastic doesn’t happen soon.
To help myself understand the current scene a little better, I had to look back to when the oldest brother first put his name on the dotted line. It was Frank III who did the deed, literally. He did it to help the family business get into the hotbed state at the center of Frank Junior’s Mafia connections: Missouri. Home of the Kansas City Civellas for some of Frank’s best early days at the Fremont in Vegas.
The transition to power for the eldest son would not come easy. Frank Junior’s old demons plagued the company yet again during early attempts to expand into Missouri in 1992-1993. Again, another star witness’s testimony before a gaming commission had the potential to cause Frank Junior bigger problems than he could afford. This time it was old friend and business partner Carl Thomas himself who was asked to offer on-the-record insight into the elder Fertitta’s past transgressions. He would never get the chance.
Carl Thomas’ agreement to attend an inquiry with the Missouri Gaming Commission may have been the worst—and last—decision he ever made in his life. The mystery begins with Thomas travelling to Vegas from his home in Oregon to meet with Station executives and discuss his pending testimony. If Frank Junior himself attended the November, 1993 meeting it was the last time he saw his old friend Carl.
Thomas left Vegas alone to return to Oregon before heading to Missouri. Strangely enough, Thomas never made it to Missouri. Instead he died in a still unexplained single car accident.
Stelzer adds: "At the time of his death, Thomas was driving a 1992 Chevrolet Suburban. Because he wasn't wearing a seat belt Thomas was ejected from the vehicle and apparently crushed when it rolled over. Approximately a half-ounce of cocaine was found in Thomas' jacket pocket, according to the report."
Due to the master skimmer’s untimely death, the Missouri Gaming Commission couldn’t complete their inquiry into Frank Junior and they granted licenses to Station Casinos. Even without Carl Thomas telling his story, the Missouri licenses in St. Charles and Kansas City came only with the understanding that Frank Fertitta Jr. would have absolutely no role in the company's operations.
It seemed that even the dawning of a new millenium didn’t prevent the father’s sins and bad Karma from catching up with his sons.
St. Louis Attorney Michael Lazaroff helped the Fertittas break into the Missouri market, but his crude, sloppy methods were later exposed and resulted in more heat than the Fertittas could withstand. According to another C.d Stelzer report Lazaroff later pled guilty in federal court to defrauding his law firm by going off the reservation and taking $500,000 in bonuses from Station. He also pled guilty to defrauding clients, including Station, by padding his expenses.
Stelzer's reports also revealed the following:
Investigators found Lazaroff made 205 private phone calls to former Missouri Gaming Commission Chairman Robert Wolfson on behalf of Station Casinos, which was against state law.
Testifying before the commission in August of 2000, Lazaroff said he used his personal relationship with Wolfson to increase Station's chances of getting their Kansas City gaming licenses. Lazaroff also testified that Station officials knew exactly what he was doing.
"They from time to time would ask me to run things by Chairman Wolfson and see what he knew about it," Lazaroff testified.
David Helfrey (pictured), Station's outside counsel in Missouri, had an interesting background. Perfectly suited for the occasion, Helfrey was a federal prosecutor in Kansas City before deciding to turn to a career as a criminal defense attorney. Exactly what led him to make such a drastic career move is unknown, but my instincts tell me it might have had something to do with the government paychecks not being big enough for busting open the Mob's Vegas piggy bank. Helfrey must have been pretty hard up to do such a complete 180, easily assuming a role as the unofficial Fertitta Family consigliere in Missouri after years of prosecuting so many of Frank Junior’s old associates.
Helfrey definitely knew all about the Fertitta family's background. While working as a prosecutor, he would have had to review and be familiar with FBI transcripts that recorded Frank Junior in conversations related to casino skimming operations orchestrated by Carl Thomas. FBI tapes of Thomas himself mention Fertitta repeatedly as being a part of his crew, a crew that bilked the Argent casinos out of millions and funneled much of their Vegas proceeds to Mafia families in Kansas City, Milwaukee, Cleveland and Chicago. Helfrey worked on those cases and knew all the usual suspects well. Looking back, Helfrey’s interaction to help Frank Junior’s family business in Missouri is not only ironic but also extremely telling of something bigger going on behind the scenes.
Even before I found this information about Helfrey on Stelzer's blog I had long suspected that Frank Fertitta, Jr. and Carl Thomas both cooperated with the government to save their skins. If that is true, of course it would be essential to keep the whole matter an untold secret forever. The Mafia’s “Oath of Omerta” places made men in the organization in a position that forbids them from revealing any family secrets. The “rat” is the most unforgivable scum on the face of the earth in Mafia tradition, and all rats are punishable by death.
Yet, if it wasn’t for the rat’s existence, the worldwide power of La Cosa Nostra would be inconceivably and exponentially stronger than it is today. With the help of the Federal Witness Protection Program, even a "made" turncoat like Sammy "The Bull" Gravano bucked the rat rubout trend and moved on relatively unscathed after corroborating with the government against his high level Mafia associates. More than ever in this day and age the organized families have had to burrow their operations further and further underground, cut out the swaggering old-school bravado, and crack down on risky behavior that leads to government investigations. Those investigations typically start small, with a “little fish” being hooked as a primary low-level informant to take out all the bigger fish, exactly like a rat infected with Bubonic Plague biting everyone it can before it goes down itself.
As I know all too well now from my own family’s law enforcement history, the government has also experimented with recruiting big fish informants in the hope that they will be able to devour all the little fish criminals beneath them and around them. The theory must be: if the process works one way it could work the opposite way, too. This means that our own government sometimes works directly in coordination with known mass murderers, drug kingpins, master extortionists and leg breakers. A few casino skimmers cooperating with the government doesn’t seem too far fetched in that context. I'm not sure if any "big fish" operations were hugely successful, but 20/20 hindsight in some of the government's most high-profile interaction with "big fish" reveal that the technique was often a miserable failure (see Osama Bin Laden and James Whitey Bulger).
Next time you go fishing, I wouldn't recommend throwing a giant fish on a rope into the depths hoping it will eventually swallow a smaller one. Even if that angling technique were to miraculously work for you, it's certainly not practical. Eventually the fish either escapes or stops working for you. As an avid fisherman myself, I recommend sticking to the bait bucket full of shiners. You'll catch much more prey in the long run by putting small guys out there for the big guys to eat up with your hook.
If Frank Junior did inform on his associates secretly, David Helfrey’s coming to the aid of Station Casinos is likely not a mere coincidence.
Helfrey’s transition to a criminal defense lawyer from a federal prosecutor obviously rises to the level of curiosity, but it’s not unheard of by any means. I’m sure it’s not at all that uncommon for state and federal prosecutors to get burnt out and grow tired of government service. The private sector can be lucrative as an attorney, and some hardened prosecutors maybe even develop a soft spot eventually for the innocent guys they sometimes have to go after, the folks who get convicted before the right evidence is revealed to show they didn’t do it.
So, the fact that Helfrey changed careers is not the real surprise. What is really amazing is how Helfrey so zealously went from going after the old Vegas skimming operations to trying to cover them up as far as Frank Junior’s involvement. It doesn’t compute when you try to reconcile the fact that Helfrey heard all the evidence incriminating Fertitta for his role in the Argent skimming but then went to bat for the same guy to help get him another casino license he could potentially utilize to skim again for the same Kansas City organization. It all makes a heck of a lot more sense to surmise that Helfrey didn’t help Frank Fertitta, Jr. in Missouri for nothing. Maybe Helfrey instead acted out of a sense of loyalty to Fertitta for Frank’s help in bringing down his former KC Mob associates, which paved the way for Helfrey to start his own successful law practice. Helfrey had been the lead prosecutor in the mob trial in which Frank Junior was revealed to be an associate of organized crime, and the lead investigator in the case was then-FBI agent Gary Hart, who was also Helfrey's law partner in 2000 and still works at Helfrey’s firm today. Both just might have worked in concert under the auspices of their firm to return the favor Fertitta may have done for them in the 80s by turning State’s evidence on the sly.
Fertitta and Thomas were friendly enough to buy their own casino together, but did they sing together as well? It would certainly explain the balls to the wall approach Helfrey took in support of the Fertitta family. Though, corruption, greed, and a complete lack of a moral backbone could also explain Helfrey's huge change of heart. Nobody really knows the real answer at the moment, but it certainly begs further examination in light of Lefty's post-mortem revelation.
At one of the Missouri hearings regarding Station Casinos, as described by Stelzer, retired FBI agent and former Gaming Commissioner William Quinn testified. Quinn detailed three meetings he had with Helfrey when the former federal prosecutor was acting as Station's lawyer. The two already knew each other because they both worked together on the Strawman cases. The overall FBI operation the two men helped build resulted in the conviction of 19 Mafia members in the Midwest, including the Civellas brothers of Kansas City. The investigations and prosecutions shattered skimming operations at the Hacienda, Fremont, Stardust and Tropicana casinos in Vegas.
Quinn testified that, on one occasion, Helfrey asked him to meet with him and a Station's representative. Quinn also revealed that Helfrey came to Station’s rescue in Missouri only after the Lazaroff scandal broke. However, Quinn discovered that Helfrey was already representing Station in a legal capacity in other matters before Lazaroff went completely off the reservation in Missouri.
To make matters worse for Helfrey, if the attorney did obtain a meeting with Quinn including a Station’s representative, such a meeting would have been in violation of the Commission's "ex parte" rule. The “ex parte” rule was set up in 1994 to make sure that state gaming commissioners did not fall under the influence of the casinos that they were supposed to be regulating. Quinn said he was concerned about his former colleague's suggestion and he refused to meet with Helfrey and the Station's representative.
On behalf of Station Casinos, Helfrey went after Lazaroff with particular intensity, and the crooked, influence-peddling lawyer was an easily intimidated target. He reportedly attempted to take his own life after being caught up in the Station scandal in Missouri, and he told anyone who would listen that he feared the possibility of being rubbed out. Lazaroff retained state police protection during and after the Missouri Gaming Commission hearings that were held in Jefferson City in the summer of 2000 as a result. The embattled lawyer even claimed that Helfrey personally delivered a veiled death threat. Helfrey could be a very imposing person, and Lazaroff himself testified as much:
QUESTION:
“Okay. Did you have any further meetings with -- with Mr. Nielson while he was in the area?”
LAZAROFF’S ANSWER:
“Yeah. Monday, December the 6th we met at the law office of Arthur Margulis, and it was Mr. Margulis and myself, Rich Haskins, Scott Nielson and David Helfrey. And during that meeting Mr. Helfrey said words to the effect of, we don't think that the Commission has anything. We have your sworn testimony that you did not have ex parte conversations. And there will -- there will undoubtedly come a time where you'll be tempted to lie in order to save yourself because of all of these other problems that you have, but we know that you'll do the right thing. Okay? And that was repeated. And I remember walking out of that meeting and turning to Scott and said, I don't want to meet with that guy ever again. He scares the Hell out of me. And Scott said -- said to me, he scares the Hell out of me too.”
Lazaroff was eventually prosecuted for his multiple crimes, and he even pleaded guilty, but not before he rolled over on many of those he had bilked money from in the first place, including Station Casinos executives. In return, U.S. District Court Judge Charles Shaw gave him the country-club treatment. Lazaroff was sentenced to 30 days in jail, 90 days' house arrest in his Town & Country manse, 120 days' community service and restitution.
Station Casinos was finally forced to pull up stakes and leave Missouri like a dog with its tail between its legs in the closing days of 2000. A November 29, 2000 Las Vegas Review Journal article reported: “Station Casinos' Missouri license renewals were rendered unlikely by a disciplinary cloud hanging over the company. Six company officials refused to obey subpoenas to appear at an August meeting of the commission."
Carl Thomas died in early November of 1993, and exactly 7 years later Station Casinos found itself embroiled in hearings and investigations that would lead to their ouster from Missouri on bad terms. The state gaming commission eventually voted unanimously to strip Station and its top executives of their Missouri licenses. Station also agreed to pay a $1 million fine in November of 2000. A voluntarily surrender of its licenses precluded Station’s departure from the state for good late that year.
During his hiatus from holding the full official, financial and managerial reigns of Station Casinos Frank Fertitta Junior has maintained his land buying and trading ways, given a great deal of cash to charities and civic interests, and laid relatively low other than his various publicly reported Republican Campaign contributions.
Frank Junior himself gave Gillespie $5,000, each of his sons gave $10,000, Wife Victoria Fertitta gave $5,000, and Fertitta Enterprises gave yet another $5,000:
As for the guy Gillespie replaced, the retiring Sheriff Bill Young found fast work. A 2007 Las Vegas Review Journal report explained:
Station Casinos even put out campaign flyers for currently-sitting Clark County District Court Judge Timothy Williams’ successful campaign for the bench. The company publicly endorsed him for his judge’s seat. Williams was the first judge to oversee my existing case against Xyience. When I raised the issue that the judge’s own Web-site showed the Station Casinos endorsement letter, Williams did not recuse himself, although he did rule in my favor in the first hearing I was actually able to appear at.
I have even heard that Frank Junior still does butt into some Fertitta Enterprises company business, and some inside sources have told me Frank Junior put some of his very own money behind the $12 million Xyience bailout. Perhaps the most interesting aspect of Frank Junior’s life that I’ve discovered in my investigations is that I’m told he goes to church services every single day. I’m sure the question’s been asked a billion times or more, but yet again it reveals itself here: can one be loyal to God and Mob at the same time?
Looking back it's easy to see how Frank Junior’s blacklisted enterprise could only expand itself for so long in the same place. It's easy to imagine the pressure he must have felt to get out of the town that wouldn’t let him take an inch of new gaming territory without a fight. Yet, he could not escape his reputation by crossing state lines. His organized crime history still impacted the Missouri situation heavily. The state only opened up for the Fertitta family because of the tragic and suspicious death of someone who could have stopped the whole operation cold just by telling the truth about what he knew about Frank Junior's past. Whatever happened on that stretch of farm road in Oregon in November of ‘93 is only known by one entity who’s willing to protest, and it seems that entity is the curse of Carl Thomas.
In our next installment we’ll explore the current Fertitta Empire, including the Zuffa purchase. We’ll focus on the folks I call “The Brothers Fertitta” and their billionaire boom days. We’ll also lay out exactly why Station Casinos now faces a flat out financial bust due to overbuying land and gambling on better days for the Vegas suburbs hit hardest by the housing crisis.
CHAPTER TWO IN A FOUR-PART FERTITTA FAMILY HISTORY
By: Rich Bergeron
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When Frank Fertitta, Jr. came to Las Vegas from Galveston, Texas in 1960, he quickly found work as a bellboy at the Tropicana. Fertitta’s Texas-bred “family” history included decades of successful casino operations in Las Vegas ( see part one of this report) that some experts say was the original model for Vegas. Fertitta—just a 20-something visionary at the time with both smart business sense and shady, underworld connections—fit right into the landscape. Frank’s rise to owning his own casino would only take him 16 years.
Fertitta graduated through the ranks quickly and gained respect from the Kansas City Civella crime family. Fertitta ascended to a position as a blackjack dealer and worked up to management while making friendships with very influential Vegas movers and shakers.
In 1969, Nick Civella was identified by a Senate committee as being a principal member of the Kansas City Crime Family. During a 10-day period in mid-January 1970, the FBI picked up information through listening devices to indict Civella and several others on gambling conspiracy charges involving the recent Super Bowl between Kansas City and Minnesota. The Civellas were caught up in a criminal probe in 1970 after Civella was taped discussing that year’s impending Super Bowl between the Kansas City Chiefs and Minnesota Vikings.
Eventually the Super Bowl tapes would convict Civella of gambling charges, which resulted in a 20-month imprisonment that he began serving in 1977. Though Civella would only do short time and get out early for cancer surgery, the informant who testified to send him to the Big House ended up suffering a far worse fate. Sol Landie was viciously murdered by four black men who first took turns sexually abusing his wife while he was forced to watch. Though he was never convicted for ordering the hit, the Karma for that killing caught up with Civella a few years later when he wound up spending most of the last days of his life behind bars.
In February 1983, Civella, who had been at the federal medical facility in Springfield, was transferred back to Leavenworth so he could be closer to his attorneys. Four days after the transfer he was returned to Springfield for treatment. Federal authorities released him to his family on March 1 and Civella was quickly admitted to the Menorah Medical Center in Kansas City where he died on March 12, 1983.
These were the kinds of associates Frank Fertitta, Jr. would find himself haunted by over the next few decades as he built his "family" interest in Vegas. Still, he and his sons transformed his original stake in “The Casino” in Vegas from virtually nothing into one of the largest gaming empires on the planet. Though he eventually had to cede the control of the business to his sons, his fatherly guidance behind-the-scenes has no doubt helped shape the business through its most tumultuous times.
The following video clips explain a bit about general Vegas history and the evolution of the early “skim.” Though I doubt anyone in Vegas truly believes organized crime no longer exists there, the acceptance and open reign of known Mobsters in Vegas was once accepted and understood as the way things were. People always seemed willing to look the other way when it was convenient and everyone was getting a bonus for it. Over the last few decades as Vegas became a boom town people flocked to in droves, the Mafia influence has been pushed further and further underground. As reporter George Knapp explains in one of these clips, the concern in more recent years is that organized crime’s tendrils have become more sophisticated, much less obvious, and more focused on so-called “clean money.” Ruthless business deals in Vegas now may be metaphorically cut-throat, but they don’t usually involve so much actual murder and mayhem anymore. A look back at the city’s rocky history and corrupt underbelly reveals a great deal about why it seems to stand so hopelessly idle today. Greed kills:
Frank Junior got his big break in 1976 when he bought a place aptly named “The Casino” (quickly re-named Bingo Palace) with a partner, Carl Thomas. The Bingo Palace later became known as Palace Station. Thomas was at that time already the chief executive officer of four casinos owned by the Argent Corporation. The movie “Casino” starring Joe Pesci (playing Tony “The Ant” Spilotro) and Robert Deniro (playing Frank “Lefty” Rosenthal) is one of the best illustrations of the skimming operation Thomas masterminded for the Mafia.
Carl Thomas’ criminal coming out party took place in Chicago in 1963 while Thomas was celebrating at friend Allen Dorfman’s 40th birthday bash. Thomas had already learned the ropes of skimming in his early days at the still-standing Circus Circus Casino in Las Vegas:
Thomas, also a former blackjack dealer like Frank Junior, was the general manager of the Circus Circus when he came to the Dorfman birthday party, and he’d impressed the guest of honor enough to warrant an introduction to another party guest: Kansas City Crime Boss Nick Civella. That connection would pave the way for Thomas to become the ultimate Las Vegas skimming mastermind. He would help reap millions upon millions of illegitimate income for organized crime interests, choking it all out of the desert with expert ease and relying on a “connected” network of loyal associates to get the job done and keep quiet about it.
Carl Thomas brought Frank Fertitta, Jr. in to be general manager of the Argent-owned Fremont. Frank Junior’s gaming career would forever have a dark cloud hanging over it after federal agents finally sniffed out the massive skimming enterprise. However, even before the FBI fully infiltrated Vegas’ best kept secret in the mid-80s, the Allen Glick-run Argent had some sketchy dealings related to a slot machine scam.
Allen R. Glick was what is most often referred to in real estate as a “straw man.” Famous and/or privacy minded folks, and especially criminal folks like Mafioso often resort to having lesser known and more inconspicuous individuals buy their businesses and other property to avoid investigation of their assets or to avoid the prying eyes of the press and/or Papa Razzi. Glick was just one of many in a long line of Mafia straw men who populated Vegas in the pioneering days when the Mafia’s Teamster connections gave the country’s organized crime families a virtual monopoly in town.
According to Glick, he was told by Civella after getting the Teamster loan that gave him his Vegas start, "Cling to every word I say … if it would be my choice, you wouldn’t leave this room alive. You owe us $1.2 million. I want that paid. In addition, we own part of your corporation, and you are to do nothing to interfere with it … We will let Mr. Rosenthal continue with the casinos, and you are not to interfere."
Thomas had much more sinister partners than Frank Fertitta, Jr. during the Argent days, and they’d already managed to get themselves black booked in town as charter members of the infamous list of Vegas outcasts. Thomas, Rosenthal and Glick were subordinate to Giuseppe Nicoli "Mr. Nick" Civella and Carl "the Cork" Civella, brothers and bosses of the La Cosa Nostra chapter in Kansas City at the time. After the Texas boom busted for the Fertitta family, Kansas City quickly became Grand Central for Vegas Mafia interests. The key was the Teamster loans Mafioso so easily influenced. Moe Dalitz got one to build Vegas' first ever Casino: The Desert Inn, but that was back in the heady Maceo era, and Sam Maceo himself reportedly pulled all the right Strings to get Dalitz his first Vegas loans.
The Fertitta and Thomas partnership was later detailed by Nicholas Pileggi, who authored the book “Casino.” The movie of the same name is based on Pileggi's book. Here is an excerpt from the book regarding a Nov. 28, 1978 FBI recording in which Frank Junior’s name surfaced in relation to his role in the skim:
“Carl Thomas: ... Me and Frank (Fertitta) and (Don) Shepard and my bookkeeper, my comptroller, who is one thousand percent, they're with me for fifteen years, have sat around in my kitchen thinking. For six hours, thinking of ways to beat these joints `cause (I or I'd) like to take money out of them. ...”
Federal agents launched operations called Strawman I and Strawman II to attack organized crime interests in Vegas in the late 70s and early 80s and figured out that Thomas, the Civellas and others conspired to conduct the skim at all the Argent casinos for the benefit of several Mafia families. A dozen associates were eventually convicted in Kansas City in a 1985 trial that resulted from the federal probes. Thomas—already stewing in jail on a 15-year sentence for a skimming conviction—gave up the ghost. He testified against his former partners in return for immunity from prosecution and somehow miraculously avoided the same agonizing fate of Sol Landie.
Thomas never did implicate Frank Fertitta. Instead, Frank bought out Carl’s interest in the Bingo Palace when the skimming charges first surfaced. The asking price was more fitting for a bid on The Price is Right game show than it was for an established Vegas Casino. Legend has it that Frank Junior acquired full ownership and control over the Bingo Palace for just one dollar.
Fertitta has consistently denied any involvement, and he never was indicted or charged in the Argent skimming. He would not fully shake the charges against him in his adopted home state until 1989 when he was cleared in a Nevada Gaming Control Board probe. The investigation centered on whether or not Frank Junior lied about his role in the Argent skimming when he received his Nevada gaming license. To nab him, the board would have to rely on damning testimony from one of Carl Thomas’ former skimming security agents: Harry McBride.
Cold feet fueled by fears that his account of the skimming days would never trump Fertitta’s political connections in Nevada led McBride to tank his own testimony before the Gaming Control Board. McBride previously testified in court that he ran counter-surveillance against law enforcement for Thomas at the Argent properties. McBride had already detailed under oath how “Frank” ran the skimming operation in the Fremont Casino’s count room, yet it was apparently not enough for Nevada gaming officials to act on without McBride actually appearing before the commission and telling his full story. The four-year probe by the commission ended with a 2-1 decision to take no action taken against Frank Junior.
Frank Fertitta, Jr. was recorded in a 1979 FBI wiretap as part of the Strawman probes as he spoke with Carl Thomas and Tropicana Hotel Manager Don Shepard about one particular scheme to alter the weighing of the take to facilitate more skimming. Casino managers altered the scales so they read only a third of the actual weight of the coins. Even with what seem like extremely incriminating statements made on tape and McBride’s on-the-record court testimony about Frank’s part in the skim, Fertitta somehow escaped indictment:
FBI Wiretap of the Bingo Palace Casino, Las Vegas, Nev. Feb 7, 1979.
9.00pm outgoing call:
Frank Fertitta Jr, Carl Thomas voices heard, inaudible conversation takes place between them as the number 9739-2222 is dialed from The Bingo Palace.
FEMALE OPERATOR: Tropicana
FERTITTA: Don Shepard, please (casino manager)
FERTITTA: Hello Shep.
SHEPARD: Yeah.
FERTITTA: Frank.
SHEPARD: What are you doing?
FERTITTA: I’m sitting here having a glass of wine with Mr. Thomas.
SHEPARD: Oh, good.
FERTITTA: He’s telling me how smart he is and, I’m sitting here listening to him like an idiot.
SHEPARD: Yeah.
FERTITTA: Yeah.
SHEPARD: If you need anybody to tell you how dumb you are come on over, I’m pretty good at that.
FERTITTA: (Laugh)
SHEPARD: Ah, this, listen this conversation isn’t being recorded is it?
FERTITTA: I, I really couldn’t tell ya.
SHEPARD: Yeah. Ask, ask, a ask Carl if anybody’s going to go boogie-ing tonight. I’m ready to boogie, do a little YMCA number.
FERTITTA: You’re ready?
SHEPARD: Oh, yeah, shit, yeah.
FERTITTA: Jesus Christ, I don’t believe this.
SHEPARD: I’m just sitting here, my legs are twitching. I can hardly wait to dance.
FERTITTA: We, were just talking about going out of town or something.
SHEPARD: Oh, yeah, well actually I should go out of town to dance.
INTERUPTION OF RECORDING
SHEPARD: Did you see me?
FERTITTA: I didn’t see you.
SHEPARD: Oh?
FERTITTA: No.
SHEPARD: A quarter of it whatever.
FERTITTA: Right, so if these coins cost us say $20,000, we got $150,000 on, you know, we’re going to have like $130,000 in excess cash.
SHEPARD: Yeah.
FERTITTA: You know.
SHEPARD: Yeah. We don’t have that problem over here.
FERTITTA: Well, yea, you…well I don’t mean excess cash, but I mean more cash than they have so, I don’t think its funny here.
SHEPARD: We’ve got. I’ve got about like $80,000 stock piled.
FERTITTA: Yeah.
SHEPARD: You know or something, we, we haven’t felt any crunch or anything I was just curious if you’re, you know.
FERTITTA: Well we had $50,000 see, but I didn’t want to make the change over here until we got them all cause $50,000 wouldn’t, you know, we couldn’t make the change with 50, so, ah, we need like 150.
SHEPARD: When are you going to switch your tokens?
FERTITTA: As soon as I get them all.
SHEPARD: Yeah.
FERTITTA: I’ll switch in fact I think we’re supposed to have them all. Oh, Jimmy gave me a date today, but I’ve forgot what it was. Ah, now maybe next week or something, then I’ll probably just go ahead and switch over.
SHEPARD: Okay, well listen I’ll talk to you.
FERTITTA: OK
Fertitta’s good fortune would not last, and the skimming suspicions would resurface later on. Yet, with the statute of limitations up on potential criminal charges and the 4-year gaming control board probe dead in the water Frank Junior was free to begin setting the stage for the Fertitta Family empire in Vegas. By then, the old Bingo Palace had made its transformation into Palace Station and Frank Junior hired son Frank Fertitta III to be the General Manager in 1985.
Both of Frank Junior’s sons were well educated and groomed to operate successful businesses from a very young age. Dinner table conversation often revolved around business in their younger days, and the brothers proved to be excellent students who heeded their father’s lessons. They had plenty of business to discuss as the 80s saw 13 expansion projects for the original Fertitta property.
Frank Fertitta III and Lorenzo Fertitta would not completely take over the reigns of the family casino business until 1993 when Frank Junior officially retired, relegating himself to more of an observer and advisor role and elevating Frank III to the official owner title. Looking back, it seems to have been more of a symbolic move on the elder Fertitta’s part designed to appease the Nevada Gaming Control Board. A 90s boom period under the official supervision of the sons saw 8 different casino interests added to the Vegas family empire between 1994 and 2001. That same kind of acquisition rate might have been impossible as long as Frank Jr.’s past could be brought up to shed a bad light on future gaming license applications.
It appears that a 1992 foray for the family into Missouri may have been what finally forced the father’s hand to sign Station Casinos over to his son Frank III. State gaming regulators swooped in and demanded answers to the skimming allegations against the father, and the Fertitta family would find almost nothing but misery in Missouri until an old associate’s untimely death in late 1993 cleared the way for their casinos to come to town.
Frank Junior’s influence and his intricate history of Mob ties have remained hidden and unexplored of late. Maybe because of the new “clean money” mantra the sons maintain in the public eye today. Maybe because not enough people care to look deep enough or far enough back to understand it all. Whatever the reason, by shedding the weight of their father’s tainted reputation and scratching his name from the company’s deeds, the sons blazed a new era that eventually landed the brothers on the Forbes 500 list.
PART THREE OF THIS SERIES: “7 Years of Bad Luck” chronicles the Fertitta Family’s unsuccessful attempts to branch out and solidify casino interests in Missouri.
Chapter One: The Maceos and Fertittas establish rackets and roots in Texas:
By: Rich Bergeron
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Sam and Rosario (Rose) Maceo blossomed from humble Italian-born barbers to booming businessmen overseeing a vast array of organized crime operations from prohibition bootlegging to the gambling boom. It is well documented that back in his day Sam Maceo reported to Carlos Marcello of New Orleans, and for years New Orleans was the highest grossing entity of all the Italian based crime families––more than NY or Chicago.
Ironically, many folks seem to remember mob rule under Maceo-Fertitta control in Galveston as very safe and secure. The same sort of “Mafia nostalgia” exists in Vegas these days since corporate control has taken the “family” out of many local businesses in more ways than one. I’ve heard of safety in numbers and mob rule, but mob safety? Not even other more well-known territorial Mafia Icons like Al Capone could muscle in on Galveston’s rackets with these guys in charge. Apparently, everything was OK in Galveston as long as the Maceos and Fertittas kept their dirty work hidden in the shadows. They peddled influence with politicians and police, and the public didn’t seem to complain much. It was often the patrons themselves at places like the Balinese Room who helped hide the gambling equipment from the Texas Rangers who would eventually bring gambling to a screeching halt in Galveston. While they lasted, though, many remember those old Texas times as a little slice of Heaven while the rest of the country was in shambles:
The Maceo brothers were very well respected and treated their business customers with the utmost courtesy. They were also experts at hiding their income and their illegal activities. When the heat finally came down on the family enterprise only one bean counter, Sam “Books” Serio, would come forward while every other member of the conspiracy remained silent. Serio reported to authorities in 1951 that the enterprising family outfit took in over $3.5 million in fiscal year 1950. Three of the family’s bosses were Fertittas at the time: Frank J. Fertitta Sr., Victor J. Fertitta, and Anthony J. Fertitta. 23 indictments came down against the Maceos, Fertittas and many of their other associates this time. But there were no convictions in the long run. The Fertittas and Maceos maintained an iron grip on their illegal gaming enterprises in Galveston until long after both Sam and Rosario Maceo were in their graves. When Texas Rangers finally broke the back of the Texas mob in Galveston, it was a long abandoned Maceo family property that actually proved to be the scene of one of the biggest breaks in the case. In the summer of 1957, Sam Maceo’s Hollywood Supper Club became a slot machine storage area while Texas Rangers squatted in all the local casinos trying to dissuade customers from sticking around while they snooped around for whatever clues they could find to bring down the operation:
The over-ambitious politicos who wanted to publicize the bust actually did haul a bunch of the slot machines into the Gulf of Mexico and dumped them ceremoniously for a bevy of press to snap some opportunistic photos and write glowing stories about the successful operation. Later on the move proved to be a political disaster as not all of the machines sank. The Army Corps of Engineers fumed about the machines fouling their waters. Still, it was the beginning of the end for gambling in Galveston.
Here’s a concise history of Sam and Rosario Maceo’s reign over Texas rackets:
Eventually Texas gambling was made obsolete by the blossoming desert flower called Las Vegas, and Mob interests began to focus intently on the area with easy access to massive Teamster loans. Yet, that wasn’t the only money going into these shady Vegas Mafia expansion operations. If you want to go deep into the conspiracy theories and enjoy reading a great deal of spastic, disorganized JFK assassination forum posts, go here:
What Sam and Rosario Maceo were able to do with their sway over the Texas illegal rackets and their shrewd business tactics, the Fertittas have since taken to a whole new level. Old habits never die, especially proven ones. More often than not the old ways simply adapt with the changing times.
It is important to look at the full spectrum of this family and their part in the history of illicit and illegal profiteering in America. When you fully examine the foundation the Fertittas' business empire is built on, you have to wonder how it could ever be possible to completely shake the Mafia influence on the family and its business strategies. Even at this late stage in the game while the latest Fertitta brothers Lorenzo and Frank III are viewed by much of the the public as smart, upstanding businessmen with no more Mob ties, they operate with the kind of overzealous impunity that only “connected guys” can muster. They rule the roost in Vegas with bullish bravado, and their role in the Xyience bankruptcy being tied to the Global Cash Access Holdings skimming scandal reveals the potential for a whole new conspiracy that hasn’t yet been fully explored.
And that brings us to the next chapter of the family history: The Vegas pioneering of Frank Fertitta, Jr. and his role in skimming the take at the Fremont Hotel. In the next installment, we’ll look at what saved Frank Junior from going to jail with all his buddies when the FBI’s “Strawman” investigations ravaged mob rule in Vegas. We’ll look at what finally broke Frank Junior and led him to give up control of the family business to his son Frank III (Frankie “Three Sticks”). We’ll explore how the Fertitta empire came to pass, built on a one-dollar transaction between friends. We’ll trace Frank Junior’s steps from his 1960 arrival in Vegas to his present day behind the scenes role as a Fertitta Enterprises and Station Casinos consultant and a major republican party influence peddler. We’ll also touch on how the sins of the father wound up setting the stage for the sons becoming ruthless business tycoons. We’ll get into how Missouri gaming authorities put Frank Junior under such a microscope that he was forced to forget about doing business there on his own. He signed the business over to Frank III and may have even made his old friend Carl Thomas disappear to prevent him from telling Missouri gaming officials what he knew about Frank Junior’s skimming at the Fremont. We’ll rehash how Frank Junior’s skimming operation is portrayed in the movie Casino and touch on how the Global Cash Access connection represents the possibility of a worldwide skimming enterprise masterminded by the Fertittas and the GCA castoffs who bankrupted Xyience for them.
We will also assess where the Fertittas are at today with Station Casinos nearing collapse and their Vegas piggy bank shattered. They may just be down to their last pennies, and bankruptcy appears imminent. The way the news is coming out piecemeal and because the Fertittas seem to be scrambling to screw with their financing arrangement leads me to believe that they are determined to prevent a bankruptcy, but it may not be up to them. If it doesn’t come from their own pockets and selling off other major Fertitta Enterprises assets, the rescue package that saves Station Casinos will have to come from someone with even bigger profit margins and deeper pockets.
Unlike the Texas ranger threat that led to the family’s Texas exodus (only Tillman Fertitta stuck it out and prospered there) and the deaths in the family that helped along the collapse of the illegal infrastructure there, in Vegas the Fertittas are going to be vanquished by their own insatiable greed and want for more. Their Vegas luck seems to have run out, even though they followed the same principles that allowed their ancestors Sam and Rosario Maceo to die free, wealthy men. If history proves anything however, the Fertittas will not go down with the ship. They will find a way to avoid incrimination, escape accountability, and resurface elsewhere. They will bounce back, and in doing so they just might become even more ruthless and cut-throat than they already are. Regardless of whether or not the ghosts of the Maceo family are still haunting the Fertittas, the new regime can very well be considered gangsters. They may not carry Thompson Machine Guns or make people kiss their rings, but they live and breathe with gangster blood running through their veins. Their minds are pre-programmed with the old-school way of doing things, conditioned by their father’s well-worn experience dancing the fine line between legal and illegal business activity. The Mafia’s connection like an umbilical cord to the Fertitta family’s history can in many ways never be cut. The brothers Fertitta will never be able to outrun their family’s reputation.
Though up to this point the Fertitta “family” secret hasn’t really burned them much at all, the family’s personal financial burn rate is said to be in excess of a hundred million each year even as their company is leveraged with massive debt. Perhaps being so used to having that kind of expendable cash around is what led to the brothers deciding to pocket much of the $350 million senior secured credit facility they acquired for Zuffa, LLC in the summer of 2007.
And who could forget Dana White? While the guy doesn’t have much of a history at all and his upbringing is a tale of two sides of the country (stints in Maine, Boston, and Vegas), Dana White does seem overly fascinated with the gangster set. In some ways he’s like the wanna be gangster errand boy who never got made. Still, he became fast friends with Lorenzo Fertitta in high school at Bishop Gorman in Las Vegas, and he never did forget his South Boston roots, either. White just spent some time in his old stomping grounds with a couple of guys who aren’t afraid to admit their thug life resume.
Jimmy Martorano's brother John Martorano confessed to killing 20 people and was only sentenced to 12 years time for the murders, most of which were carried out at the behest of South Boston Crime Lord-turned FBI Informant James “Whitey” Bulger. Patrick Nee helped Whitey with enforcement as well and played a pivotal role in one potential whistleblower’s disappearance and death. Suffice it to say Nee drove young John McIntyre to his last appointment with Bulger who tortured, strangled, and shot McIntyre with Stephen “The Rifleman” Flemmi’s help. Since McIntyre confessed to helping Bulger with an IRA gun shipment, his tongue was ripped out with a pair of pliers. And these two guys who assisted efforts like that are considered “gentlemen” by Dana White’s standards.
The whole Whitey Bulger saga has been front page news for decades, and still today there are ongoing cases involving the principal players, and of course Bulger remains a fugitive. My father was on the other side of the law fighting against the influence of organized crime in South Boston during Bulger and Flemmi’s rise to power, and he came face to face with Whitey himself on a few occasions. Dad has a whole chapter about his organized crime investigations in “Black Mass” and a particularly tragic connection to McIntyre.
And so, there are many parallels and contrasts in the situation I now find myself in. The Fertittas seem to be carrying on the traditions of their fathers and grandfathers and great uncles. Even though I never pursued a career in criminal justice myself, I wound up falling back on the same instincts that made my father a good cop. Like the Fertitta family tree is populated with Mafioso, my family is made up of a high percentage of police officers and government agents. We have a face-off here between the direct offspring of a criminal mastermind and the direct offspring of an honest cop done in by the government’s unclean hands. It’s just too classic, but at the same time it represents the principle that led me to writing non-fiction rather than flashy novels: Fact is stranger than fiction. I know in the movies the hero usually wins, but reality is much more cruel in situations like this. I just hope in the end my work isn’t made meaningless by some yet unforeseen hand of fate, and I hope the Fertitta family history of getting away unscathed is drastically altered. It would be fitting justice if the current economic crisis is what finally puts the spotlight on the corruption involved here, as I truly believe it is people like the Fertittas who have created this crash and burn climate. All we can hope for now is that they’ll actually end up paying for the damage they’ve done.
UP NEXT: FROM BELLBOY TO BUSINESS TYCON: HOW FRANK JUNIOR BUILT THE FERTITTA EMPIRE IN LAS VEGAS AND WHAT HIS SONS HAVE DONE TO PUT THE WHOLE OPERATION IN JEOPARDY
