Posted on 10/16/2008 9:05:23 AM PDT by prolifefirst
Frank "Lefty'' Rosenthal was a Chicago bookie who was sent to Las Vegas by the mob and helped turned sports betting into a billion-dollar business. The manager of several well-known casinos, his life inspired the Martin Scorsese movie "Casino.''
Rosenthal, 79, died Monday after a heart attack at his Miami Beach condo.
Born in 1929 in Chicago, Rosenthal got involved in illegal bookmaking and eventually connected with mobsters. His nickname stemmed from a 1961 Senate hearing on gambling and organized crime at which he invoked the Fifth Amendment protection against self-incrimination 38 times. Throughout his testimony, he kept his left hand raised, leading to the "Lefty" moniker.
He went to Las Vegas in 1968, ran several mob-owned casinos in the 1970s and 1980s and was involved in setting up the original sports books in Las Vegas, where the bets were legal, taking the business away from local bookies, said Jim Wagner, a former FBI agent and past president of the Chicago Crime Commission. "I don't think we will see anyone along the likes of Lefty again because of his ability to set the odds and run the sports book the way he did," said Wagner. "He was one of a kind.''
The mob sent Tony Spilotro to keep an eye on Rosenthal. That relationship turned sour when Spilotro had an affair with his wife and later, in 1982, planted a car bomb in Rosenthal's 1981 Cadillac Eldorado. Rosenthal was blown out of the car but survived.
Spilotro wasn't so lucky. At the Operation Family Secrets mob trial in federal court here last year, witnesses testified the affair was part of the reason Spilotro was killed and dumped in an Indiana cornfield -- and also because the attempted hit on Rosenthal hadn't been OKd by the Chicago Outfit.
Rosenthal left Las Vegas after he was banned from going to casinos in the late 1990s. But he returned yearly, in disguise, to visit old friends and employees, said Steve Fischer, author of When the Mob Ran Vegas: Stories of Murder, Mayhem and Money. "Many of the working people in Vegas really liked him,'' Fischer said.
He didn’t whack anybody. And most of his criminal activity was legal in Vegas (gambling), that’s why they moved him there. And he sure had an eye for the sports book.
Caution: Profanity.
You don’t talk to a man like Moe Greene like that!
I lived in Las Vegas when all that happened. Casino is one of the few movies that portrays the mob for what it really is.
Tony Spilotro was the outside or street boss for the Chicago mafia. He was nothing but a nasty thug.
bkmark
ping
If you are in the “business†about zero. If you are a civilian not to bad.
Lefty’s lawyers were Oscar Goodman and Jay Brown when they went up against “Mr. Cleanface” Harry Reid. Curiously, Jay Brown now owns a lot of property with Harry, some of it showed up in Harry’s recent real estate scandals where he wasn’t reporting property transactions. This is only part of Harry’s links to mob connected people, Don Williams was also a campaign manager. Good ole clean face.
HEY MONK that movie was on other day on USA networks
That baseball scene was very real they found the bodies of Nicky and his brother few years ago
Wow! That actually works! ROFL!
Yeah I think I saw Harry Reid in Casino movie
I think real reason why Nicky got rid of
A He tick off the bosses
B he mess with this guy wife
See in old days the bosses have some weird morality you don’t mess with other guy wife
It is bad for business
See that problem for old timers
They just don’t like it
“
Moe Green was played by Bobo Petriconi of Somerville
MA’s “Winter Hill” gang.
“
AKA: “Alex Rocco”
I hadn’t know he was a Winter Hill gang associate/member.
Even though I grew up in Oklahoma, I remember the guy from the Telex Co.
in Tulsa getting wacked and left in his car.
And over the years following the news to find the web of criminals
and even an FBI agent involved.
(see last link).
Even in crime “It’s a small world after all!”.
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0733678/bio
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winter_Hill_Gang
http://www.tulsaworld.com/news/article.aspx?articleID=20080918_13_A4_MIAMIF246738
Sam better watch out Palenstein woman she is cheat LOL!
I was younger but went to Orr Jr High with Leftys daughter, Robin. She had a Sharon Stone look to her way back then.
I knew a few kids who dads were pit bosses and they were all skimming money big time.
I remember meeting the head of the Landsmark casino. He had the most limp wristed shake I have ever seen. I was in an elevator with Alan Glick at one time too. The most interesting observation I have about LV, atleast at that time, they have no real social structure of society. It’s all about money.
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