Interference (82 page)
Authors: Dan E. Moldea
Sitting on the Warner board of directors with Ross and Siegel was Hugh Culverhouse, the owner of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
On March 4, 1989, Warner and Time, Inc. announced the plan to merge and form Time Warner, Inc. Warner's stockholders will reportedly own 60 percent of the new company.
3
. In May 1987, Adelson and Walters hosted a weekend celebrity tennis and golf charity affair at La Costa. Among the three hundred guests in attendance at the Adelson and Walters party were Irwin Molasky, former RCA corporate chief and MacArthur Foundation head Thorton Bradshaw, Twentieth Century-Fox head Barry Diller, Reagan's former ambassador to Mexico John Gavin, attorney and civil rights activist Vernon Jordan, talent agent Swifty Lazar,
New York Times
associate editor A. M. Rosenthal, attorney Mickey Rudin, developer Donald Trump, and publisher Mort Zuckerman, as well as a list of Lorimar's top stars, including Larry Hagman and Linda Gray.
In 1986, Adelson, Molasky, and company made a deal to purchase nine television stations, including six network affiliates. According to Jonathan Kwitny of
The Wall Street Journal
, Lorimar had to “borrow possibly as much as $2 billion, mostly in high-yield bonds to be sold to investors via Drexel Burnham Lambert.”
4
. On January 21, 1986, in Kansas City, five top underworld figures were convicted for conspiracy in the Stardust case. Among those found guilty were Joey Aiuppa, Jackie Cerone, Joseph Lombardo, Angelo LaPietra, and Milton Rockman. Frank Balistrieri had pleaded guilty earlier.
A total of seventeen organized-crime figures and their associates were convicted in three separate federal trials in Kansas City as part of the FBI's Strawman investigation.
5
. See my story “MCA and the Mob” in the June 1988 issue of
Regardie's
.
6
. During my interview with Hundley about the 1968 grand-jury investigation of the Washington Redskins, he told me that he had gone to Henry Petersen, Hundley's immediate successor as the head of the Organized Crime and Racketeering Section, to find out whether anyone involved in professional football was a target of the grand-jury investigation. Using almost the exact same words as in the MCA case with Margolis and DeFeo, Hundley told me, “I told him [Petersen] that if the department needed anything, I would supply it. If they need information from anyone, I would deliver them.” (See ch. 18.)
7
. Although the MCA case was killed, the Computer group case was renewed suddenly during the summer of 1988âwithin months after I had charged that the case had been stalled. Noble was reassigned again and returned to the FBI's office in Las Vegas to resume his investigation of the Computer group.
When I interviewed Mindlin in September 1988, he appeared to be lethargic over the case. He told me, “One of our former members, out of jealousy,
went to them [the FBI] and tried to reawaken the case. But I've retired from the wars. I've undergone severe personal tragedy with the loss of my son and wife [in 1987-88]. It's been a very devastating period of my life. All I do is trade commodities, which is very much like sports. I stay by myself. I'm on a ranch, which is very isolated.” Mindlin was acquitted in the Computer Group case on January 22, 1992.
8
. By the efforts of Ronald Goldstock and the New York Organized Crime Task Force, the heads of three of the five crime families in New YorkâTony Salerno of the Genovese group, Anthony Corallo of the Lucchese group, and Carmine Persico of the Columbo groupâand two underbosses were convicted of RICO violations. Each received a hundred years in prison and was fined $240,000 at their sentencing on January 13, 1987.
With Salerno's conviction, the acting head of the Genovese family became Vincent Gigante, who in 1957 had shot and wounded Frank Costello, forcing the old mobster into retirement.
9
. Weld added, “Just one personnel rating was given to the U.S. attorneys. Other than that, the system was maintained, pretty much, status quo. The only other change was that the U.S. attorneys' initials are required on all case initiation reports. But if ten days go by and the U.S. attorney hasn't initialed them by then, then it is deemed initialed.”
10
. Less than a week before Williams's death, the
Legal Times
reported, “Court records ⦠show that in 1986, before her marriage to [Jack Kent Cooke], Suzanne Martin had retained Edward Bennett Williams and three of his partners to negotiate a $2-million settlement with Jack Kent Cooke for mental anguish arising from her two abortions during their courtship.
“According to a Dec. 19, 1986, letter from Williams & Connolly to Suzanne Martin, the firm agreed to represent her in settlement talks for a 25-percent contingency fee.” Martin's attorney was Williams's associate Brendan Sullivan, Jr., who later became famous as “the potted plant” while serving as Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North's lawyer during his testimony before the Iran/Contra committee and at his subsequent trial.
Martin dropped her claim against Cooke, whom she later married in July 1987. Soon after, they separated when he discovered that she was pregnant and would refuse to have another abortion.
Many believe that Williams's readiness to take Martin's case was an indication of the bitter rivalry that had developed between Williams and Cooke.
11
. After forty-two years without an NFL crown, the Steelers won Super Bowl IX in 1975, defeating the Minnesota Vikings, 16-6. They repeated as NFL champions the following year, beating the Dallas Cowboys, 21-17. In Super Bowl XIII, the Steelers won their third championship, again downing Dallas, 35-31. And the year after that, Rooney's team defeated the Los Angeles Rams, 31-19.
12
. In January 1988, Snyder told a WRC-TV film crew in Washington, D.C., that blacks were better athletes than whites because they were “bred” to be. He also insisted “there's not going to be anything left for the white people” because of increased jobs for blacks in sports. For these and other racial comments, Snyder was fired by CBS after twelve years with the network's sports division.
CHAPTER 52
1
. Tony Accardo's son-in-law Ernest Kumerow had become the head of Laborers Local 1001. Kumerow's son and Accardo's grandson is Eric Kumerow, a defensive end-linebacker from Ohio State, who was the Miami Dolphins' number one draft pick in the 1988 college draft.
2
. Roxborough's company, Las Vegas Sports Consultants, now offers casinos and sports books a computerized service that transmits up-to-the-minute line changes, weather conditions, and significant injuries, as well as future book prices and proposition wagers.
3
. Another top Las Vegas oddsmaker who was paid to supply his numbers to the Stardust, forty-six-year-old Gerald “Jerry the Hat” Taffel, died from a heart attack on January 5, 1989.
4
. Las Vegas gambler Gene Madayâwho owns and operates Little Caesars, a small, independent sports book on the Strip in Las Vegasâhas made his reputation for accepting the largest sports bets in Nevada. In the 1985 Super Bowl XIX between the San Francisco 49ers and the Miami Dolphins, Maday accepted a $500,000 bet on the 49ers, who were favored by three points and lost. He also reportedly accepted a $1.05 million bet from Bob Stupak, the owner of Vegas World, on the Cincinnati Bengals, who were seven-point underdogs in the 1989 Super Bowl XXIII, and lost that bet as well. Although considerable suspicion revolves around the actual circumstances of the Maday-Stupak bet, Maday, formerly of Detroit, has earned the reputation as the boldest sports gambler in the country.
Index
PAGE NUMBERS ABOVE
436
refer to notes.
Abrams, Robert,
370
Accardo, Tony,
70-71
,
422-423
,
441
,
469
,
500
Adams, Kenneth Stanley “Bud,”
98
,
100
,
139
,
142-143
,
145
,
458
Adonis, Joe,
449
Agosto, Joseph,
491
Aguilar, Nelson,
497
Alascia, Samuel R.,
491
Alderisio, Felix,
246
Aleman, Harry “the Hook,”
474
Alioto, Joseph,
332
,
342
,
477
,
485-486
Allen, Charles,
450-451
Alo, Vincent “Jimmy Blue Eyes,”
469
Alworth, Lance,
253-255
Anderson, Donny,
141
Anderson, George,
343-345
,
347
,
487
Angelini, Donald,
87-88
,
150-151
,
239-240
,
423-424
Annenberg, Leonore,
441
Areeda, Joseph,
122
Astarita, Michael,
258-259
Atlanta Falcons,
138
,
146
,
262
,
308
Attner, Paul,
368
Azoff, Irving,
415
Bacon, Coy,
472
Baker, Bobby,
157
,
166
,
173-174
,
286
,
471
Balderelli, Libero P.,
477-478
Balicchio, Frank,
236
Balistrieri, Frank,
248
,
250-251
,
274-275
,
485
,
491
,
498
Balistrieri, Joseph Philip,
248
,
250
,
485
,
491
Baltimore Colts,
34
,
65
,
76
,
89-94
,
109-114
,
131-133
,
140
,
155
,
176
,
205
,
261-262
,
281-282
,
299
,
301
,
306
,
319
,
329
,
345-346
,
367
,
370
,
400-401
Rosenbloom's acquisition of,
79-80
,
137-138
Rosenbloom's alleged betting on,
90-92
,
112-114
,
194-195
,
198-199
Rosenbloom's swapping of,
232-234
,
322
Super Bowl III, loss of,
193-199
Banaszak, Pete,
343
Bancroft, David P.,
458
Banker, Lem,
307
,
308
,
379
,
432
,
454
Barbara, Joseph M.,
86
Barnstable, Dale,
442
Baron, Al,
250
Bartels, John, Jr.,
456-457
Bates, Jean,
169-170
Batista, Fulgencio,
95
,
130
,
447
,
476
Baugh, Sammy “Slingin,”
51-56
,
57-58
,
446
Beach, Walter,
226
Beckley, Gilbert Lee “the Brain,”
29
,
72
,
91-92
,
97
,
149
,
153-159
,
171
,
173
,
177
,
184-185
,
192
,
199
,
207
,
219
,
226
,
229
,
240-241
,
244
,
327
,
362-363
,
379
,
455-456
,
459
,
471
,
490
in cooperation with NFL Security,
163-166
,
191
disappearance of,
223-225
,
236
,
238
federal conviction of,
159
,
161-163
,
253
Fincher's association with,
292-293
games fixed by,
180-182
,
358
,
364
Behring, Ken,
402
Bell, DeBenneville “Bert,”
33-35
,
48-50
,
73-74
,
76
,
79
,
81-82
,
92
,
100
,
102
,
134
,
233
,
439
,
446
attempted fix of Giant-Bear championship game and,
57-59
bookmaker contacts of,
63-64
,
99
policy on gambling of,
59-60
,
83
Bell, Upton,
49
,
63
,
94
,
99
,
133
,
194-195
,
205
,
439
Benson, Tom,
401
Bergman, Jerry,
304
Berry, Bob,
262