Interference (89 page)
Authors: Dan E. Moldea
Wexler, Morris “Mushy,”
106-107
,
447-448
Whalen, Lawrence,
407-408
Wheelright, Ernie,
219
White, Charles,
406
Wiggins, Charles,
268
Williams, C. L.,
165
Williams, Edward Bennett,
143
,
166-167
,
173
,
175
,
185
,
192
,
267
,
284
,
313-314
,
366
,
420
,
442
,
445
,
456-457
,
465
,
481-483
,
499
Williams, Sam,
125
Wilson, David,
350
Wilson, George,
119-120
,
125
,
139
,
444
,
463
Wilson, Jan Allyson,
240
Wilson, Ralph C,
98
,
141
,
227
,
255
,
480
,
304-305
,
480
Winer, Sam “Radio,”
219-221
Wismer, Harry,
49
,
73
,
96
,
136
,
313
,
439
,
443
,
446
Wittman, Dennis,
248
,
253-255
,
472
Wofford, Tatum,
476
Wolcott, Edward,
42
Wolfner, Walter,
441
Woods, Rose Mary,
457
Wray, Lud,
48-49
Wyman, Sidney,
86
Yablonsky, Joe,
336
,
338
,
341
,
424
Yalentzas, Nick,
474
Yaras, David,
70-71
Young, Buddy,
113
Zappi, Ettore,
295
Zarowitz, Jerome,
59
,
107
,
243-244
,
469
,
479
Zaza,
115
Zicarelli, Joseph,
201
Zoppi, Tony,
189
Zwillman, Abner “Longy,”
439
Zwillman, Mary,
439
Glossary
Action:
Betting.
Bagman:
An intermediary who picks up and delivers money. Bank: The financial backer of a gambling operation.
Beard:
A proxy bettor, a front man.
Betting cards:
A system of betting in which gamblers must pick between three to twenty winners from a list of upcoming games.
Betting line:
The posted list of upcoming games and their point spreads.
Black Book:
The list of undesirable people who are forbidden to enter any casino in Nevada.
Blue box:
A device used by some bookmakers to make illegal long-distance calls.
Bookmaker:
A broker who accepts wagers from gamblers, usually taking a commission on losing bets booked.
Bottom sheet:
A bookmaker's accounting of gambling debts.
Circled game:
A contest in which only limited action is accepted.
Closing line:
The final list of point spreads offered before game time.
Covering the spread:
Beating the posted point spread.
Edge:
An advantage that one believes might improve one's ability to predict the outcome of a game.
11-10:
The traditional bet with a bookmaker in which the gambler puts up $11 to win $10.
Fall guy:
A guilty or innocent person who accepts the full blame for a crime in order to protect others.
Favorite:
The predicted winning team in a particular contest.
Fixed game:
A game in which one or more participants willfully manipulate the final outcome of a game.
Flip:
To turn state's evidence.
Front man:
One who has a façade of legitimacy but secretly represents the interests of his underworld backers.
Grease:
A bribe.
Hack:
A sportswriter who provides unconditional loyalty to a particular team or sport in order to maintain his access and sources.
Handicapper:
One who determines the conditions and sets the odds that will equalize two teams in an upcoming game.
Handle:
The total amount of money bet on a particular game or series of contests.
Hedge:
The covering of a bet with a second bet; a layoff.
High roller:
A high-stakes gambler.
House:
The operator of any gambling business.
Injury report:
A description of the status of an injured player, which is frequently used as a variable in betting equations.
Inside information:
The data obtained on a particular team or its players and/or staff that may impact upon the final outcome of a game.
Juice:
The money owed to a bookmaker or a loan shark.
Juice collector:
One who collects the juice.
Lay:
To bet.
Layoff:
A bookmaker's bet with another bookmaker made in order to help equalize the excess action he has accepted from his customers.
Line:
The posted list of games and their point spreads.
Loan shark:
One, usually mob-connected, who loans money at a high weekly interest rate.
Lock:
A sure winner.
Man-to-man betting:
Gambling without either party taking a commission for the bet made.
Marker:
An IOU.
Middling:
Betting on both teams in a game at different point spreads, in the hope that the final score comes in between so that both bets can be won.
Moving the line:
Making alterations in the line based on the volume of betting or other factors, such as injuries.
Odds:
The ratio of money that may be won versus the amount of money bet.
Oddsmaker:
A person who sets the line.
Off the boards:
A situation in which bookmakers will accept no further action.
Opening line:
The initial list of point spreads for upcoming games.
Outlaw line:
The early, private line set by professional gamblers, which is financed, distributed, and enforced by the organized-crime syndicate.
Over/under the total:
Betting that the combined score of two teams in a particular game will be over/under a predicted number.
Pari-mutuel:
A betting system in which the amount of money paid out to winners is based upon the total pool of bets.
Parlay:
Betting on a combination of two or more games.
Pen register:
A device attached to a telephone line that maintains a record of each number dialed.
Pigeon:
An uneducated, naïve, or unsophisticated gambler.
Player:
A gambler.
Point spread:
A form of handicapping in which oddsmakers predict how many points one team needs against another in order to even out the public betting on a particular game.
Power rating:
A number created by a handicapper on the basis of the strength of a particular team.
Press:
To increase one's bet.
Price:
Point spread.
Pricemaker:
An oddsmaker.
Push:
A bet that falls right on the point spread; a tie in terms of a money decision.
Runner:
A messenger.
Scalping:
Selling tickets to a contest at a price above their face value.
Shaving points:
The act of one or more participants in a contest manipulating the outcome of a game so that the final score does not cover the spread.
Skim:
The cash siphoned off from an operation before it is reported.
Spike mike:
An electronic-surveillance device.
Sports book:
A legal sports-bookmaking business.
Stand off a bet:
To tie or push.
Straw man:
A front man.
Taking a lead:
An early bet with a favorable price in anticipation of a subsequent movement in the line.
Thrown game:
A game lost intentionally by a participant.
Title III:
The section of the 1968 Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act that permits court-authorized electronic surveillance if certain conditions are met.
Tote board:
A device that posts teams, contests, and either the odds or the line.
Tout:
An individual of questionable credentials who sells his predictions of the outcomes of games.
Underdog:
The predicted losing team in a particular contest.
Unnatural money:
Large wagers that suddenly appear against the conventional wisdom of the oddsmakers and handicappers.
Vigorish:
The bookmaker's commission.
Wagering stamp:
A federal occupational tax for gamblers.
Welsh:
To refuse to pay off a bet already made and lost.
Acknowledgments
THIS WORK COULD NOT have been completed without the assistance of my associate, Washington journalist William Scott Malone, who encouraged me to write this book. Malone was the chief investigator and an associate producer of the January 1983
Frontline
program on public television, “An Unauthorized History of the NFL.” His research, interviews, and advice have been invaluable to me.
I would also like to express my gratitude to Thomas Mechling, the executive director of the National Center for Gambling Information, who conceived of the
Frontline
program. He also has done research on behalf of the National Football League Players Association.
Also essential were the help and guidance of Professor G. Robert Blakey of Notre Dame University; Ledra Brady of the Drug Enforcement Administration; Ronald Goldstock, the executive director of the New York Task Force Against Organized Crime; Patrick Healy, former Chicago Crime Commission executive director, and Jerry Gladdin, the commission's chief investigator; Aaron Kohn, the former executive director of the Metropolitan Crime Commission of New Orleans; Phil Manuel, former chief investigator of the U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations; Joe Nellis, former deputy chief counsel of the Kefauver Committee; Leroy Orozco of the Los Angeles Police Department; Vincent Piersante, former chief of the Michigan attorney general's division on organized crime; Ralph
Salerno, the former supervisor of detectives for the New York Police Department; U.S. Senate investigator and author Walter Sheridan; Washington, D.C., police detectives Carl Shoffler and Joe Quantrille; Frank Silby, former chief investigator of the U.S. Senate Labor Commission; John Sopko, deputy chief counsel of the U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations; enforcement attorney Tom von Stein of the Securities and Exchange Committee; investigator Joseph J. Theis of the U.S. Department of Labor; and Joseph Yablonsky, the former chief of the Las Vegas FBI office.
I would also like to thank those additional confidential sources of information with the Alameda County (California) District Attorney's Office, the U.S. Department of Labor, the Detroit Police Department, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, the U.S. General Accounting Office, the Internal Revenue Service, the Los Angeles Police Department, the Miami Crime Commission, the Nevada Gambling Commission, the Nevada Gaming Control Board, the New Jersey Casino Control Commission, the New Jersey State Police Intelligence Division, the Organized Crime and Racketeering Section of the U.S. Justice Department and its Strike Force field offices, the Pennsylvania Crime Commission, the San Diego Police Department, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, and the Washington, D.C., Metropolitan Police Department.
I am also grateful to several members of the sports-gambling community whose experiences and insights were extremely valuable, especially: oddsmakers Bobby Martin of New York and Michael Roxborough of Las Vegas; handicapper Mort Olshan of
The Gold Sheet
, which is based in Los Angeles; and professional gamblers Ed Curd of Miami, Donald Dawson of Detroit, Lem Banker and Marty Kane of Las Vegas, and Gene Nolan of Baton Rouge.
I would also like to thank several members of the press, including: independent investigative reporters Mike Acoca, Jack Anderson, Dick Brenneman, David Fisher, Seymour Hersh, Jonathan Kwitny, Larry Leamer, Hank Messick, Jim Neff, and Robert Pack; Lowell Bergman of CBS News; Chris Blatchford of KCBS-TV in Los Angeles; Bill Brubaker and Charles Trueheart of
The Washington Post;
Pat Clawson of
Radio & Records;
William K. Knoedelseder, Jr., of
The Los Angeles Times;
Peter Noyes of KNBC-TV in Los Angeles; Richard O'Connell and Betty Bosarge
of the Washington Crime News Service; John Oravecz of
The Pittsburgh Press;
David Robb of
Daily Variety;
Ira Rosen of ABC News; and Denny Walsh of
The Sacramento Bee
. Special thanks are given to John Hanrahan, executive director of the Fund for Investigative Journalism, who provided me with a research grant.
Deep appreciation is also extended to the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, especially executive director Jane Kirtley and attorney Warren W. Faulk of Camden, New Jersey, for their efforts on my behalf after I was subpoenaed as a defense witnessâin the midst of my work on this bookâin a 1988 federal racketeering trial and ordered to reveal a source who was quoted in my last book,
Dark Victory: Ronald Reagan, MCA and the Mob
. I refused to reveal the source and was defended by Faulk and the committee. The subpoena was eventually quashed, saving me considerable time and expense.