Arrest may affect Binion’s license

Thursday, Sept. 25, 1997 | 10:44 a.m.

The state Gaming Control Board has moved to bolster its five-count complaint against suspended Horseshoe Club executive Ted Binion.

The Control Board has asked the Nevada Gaming Commission to allow it to include in the complaint Binion's arrest last month for allegedly threatening a service station attendant with a shotgun.

In a motion, Deputy Attorney General Kirk Hendrick said that, with the arrest, Binion has brought more discredit to Nevada's casino industry.

The Gaming Commission was to take up the matter this afternoon in Las Vegas.

In May, the commission suspended Binion's license as a result of past drug use. The new complaint, seeking to ban him permanently from the casino industry, was filed several days before the suspension was handed out.

Meanwhile, Binion's lawyers, Richard Wright and Mark Ferrario, have asked the commission to dismiss three of the counts against Binion, including the charge that accuses him of associating with reputed Kansas City mob associate Peter Ribaste.

Binion has acknowledged loaning $100,000 to Ribaste, a convicted felon with alleged ties to the hierarchy of the Kansas City mob, to buy into a Las Vegas car dealership. But he has said he did not learn about Ribaste's criminal background until after he made the loan.

Wright and Ferrario argued that the board is going against its own established policy in singling out Binion for associating with Ribaste.

"The board is attempting to impose on Mr. Binion what the board has never attempted to impose: a strict liability punishment because of the background of a person not proposed or in the Black Book, the lawyers said.

Ribaste is not listed in the Black Book, which bans undesirables from entering casinos, but the Control Board is looking to nominate him.

Wright and Ferrario pointed to the case of Mirage hotel-casino host Charles Meyerson, who was accused of comping several reputed mob associates at the Strip resort, as evidence of the board's double standard.

Meyerson, they said, was found suitable to hold a license even though he acknowledged he knew some of the mob figures had "unsavory" reputations.

"The board properly concluded that the relationships of Mr. Meyerson did not rise to the level to stop him from receiving his license," the lawyers said. "The board further concluded the relationships of Mr. Meyerson did not present a threat to the state."

The lawyers added that Binion's relationship with Ribaste "pales in comparison to other circumstances approved by the board and the commission and does not come close to being a threat to the industry."

The May complaint against Binion also accuses the suspended casino executive of associating with the late Chicago underworld figure Herbie Blitzstein.

The Control Board nominated Blitzstein for the Black Book one month before he was murdered in a plot by the Los Angeles mob to muscle in on Las Vegas street rackets.

Binion had acknowledged palling around with Blitzstein on numerous occasions before his death.