Crime: Mob’s Labors Lost

Reporting on organized crime requires tenacity and a lot of patience. Months of work often prove completely unproductive, results rarely come rapidly. But last week an investigation into the mob’s reappearance in Las Vegas had an unexpectedly immediate effect.

Las Vegas was a gold mine for the Mafia from 1963 to 1966. In those years, the gangsters, including then Cleveland Mob Boss Frank Milano, “skimmed” some $12 million annually from the gaming rooms at many of the plastic palaces lining the Strip. The money was stolen from the casinos’ profits with the aid of crooked owners and divided among leaders of the Cosa Nostra. In 1966, however, the FBI and state officials stepped in, and the skimming racket was dead. Several casinos were sold to new operators, including Billionaire Howard Hughes. The mob left town, but their departure was only temporary.

Late last summer, mobsters from Cleveland and Los Angeles set in motion an ingenious scheme to slip the hand of organized crime back into the casino tills. The plan was simple: organize the city’s 7,000 plus gambling dealers into a mob-run union. Using the threat of a strike that could cripple the gambling hotels, the gangsters could persuade the owners to sign lucrative contracts for food, liquor and vending machines from firms owned by Cosa Nostra An equally distasteful prospect for casino owners would be that the dealers could become free agents, responsible only to the mobsters. If they cheated the players, or skimmed small amounts for themselves, the dealers could rely on protection from the union with its power to call a walkout. Naturally, the mob would take a healthy cut from any of the dealers’ larcenous sidelines.

Finley’s Friend. Fronting for the takeover were two Cleveland Teamster organizers, Nick Nardi and Nick Francis. They operated under the aegis of Los Angeles Cosa Nostra Chief Nicolo Licata, now serving a jail sentence for contempt, and Frank Milano. Milano’s son, Pete, worked behind the scenes to speed along the organizing effort. The two Nicks obtained 15 signatures from interested dealers and then applied for a charter to create Local 711 of the International Office and Professional Employees Union (O.P.E.U.).

According to the union’s president, Howard Coughlin, O.P.E.U. had been interested in trying to organize the dealers in Las Vegas for several years. Last summer the union’s chief counsel, Cleveland Attorney Joseph Finley, was approached by a “highly reputable” friend, Lawyer Robert Duvin. Duvin introduced Nardi and Francis as legitimate labor organizers who could unionize the dealers for O.P.E.U. if they could get a charter. Supported by Duvin’s high recommendation, Nardi and Francis were quickly approved and received their charter from O.P.E.U. Although their initial organizing attempts were resisted by some casino operators, the scheme seemed likely to succeed.

No Calling Card. Learning of the curious arrangement that led to O.P.E.U.’s issuance of Local 711’s charter, TIME Correspondent Sandy Smith began asking questions. During the course of the investigation, Duvin revealed himself as a lawyer for Pete Milano. Reporter Smith called Finley, and the attorney admitted that it was Duvin who had helped launch O.P.E.U.’s acceptance of Nardi and Francis’ local. But he was “shocked beyond words” to learn of Duvin’s connection with Pete Milano. Within minutes, Finley’s Cleveland office was on the telephone to the union’s headquarters in New York. Shortly thereafter, Arthur Lewandowsky, director of organization for O.P.E.U., let it be known that orders revoking 711’s charter had been issued that day. Denied the cover of a respectable union calling card into Vegas, the mob was thwarted, at least for the moment. Undoubtedly, it will again try to gain power in Las Vegas. The lure of millions flowing across the tables on the Strip is irresistible to Cosa Nostra’s appetite for easy money.