Mob becoming more ‘brazen’ in LV, cops say

Friday, Oct. 16, 1998 | 3:04 a.m.

The FBI's breakup of a New York mob plot to kill three escort-service operators has led law-enforcement authorities to conclude that the nation's organized-crime families have a new, violent way of doing business in Las Vegas.

This comes as Sheriff Jerry Keller on Thursday ordered a joint criminal investigation with the FBI to determine whether any of his vice officers were corrupted by escort-service operators.

Allegations that some local law-enforcement officers may have received cash and gifts surfaced during the FBI probe, which was cut short Oct. 9 after agents moved to crush the Gambino crime family's purported scheme to harm three of the most widely known outcall operators in the city.

The brazenness of that plot and the Los Angeles mob's violent attempt to take over street rackets here last year have prompted authorities to re-examine the way the nation's 26 crime families conduct their affairs in Las Vegas.

"Years ago, the mob was unwilling to whack someone here because they were afraid of the heat," Capt. Ray Flynn, head of Metro Police's Organized Crime Bureau, said Thursday. "But now that's the norm."

Flynn said the rules have changed from 15 to 20 years ago because the mob no longer wields hidden influence in Las Vegas casinos.

"When they controlled casinos, they couldn't act that brazen because nobody would stand for it," Flynn said. "But how many people would get excited about an escort-service operator?"

For years, the mob followed an unwritten rule not to murder anyone in Las Vegas because it didn't want to attract attention to its lucrative cash-skimming operations at some casinos.

But in the past 15 years, as mob bosses were convicted of skimming and sent to jail and corporate America took over casino boardrooms, organized crime's influence on the Strip all but disappeared.

The mob has resorted to focusing on the same kind of street rackets here as in other major cities across the country. Violence is the mob's way of doing business in those metropolitan areas.

Flynn said Las Vegas remains "fertile territory" for the mob.

"No one family controls Las Vegas," he said. "This has always been an open city and will continue to be an open city."

Flynn, meanwhile, expects to play a key role in a criminal investigation into the 24-member vice squad, which deals with the escort services.

Undersheriff Dick Winget said Thursday that Keller ordered the Organized Crime Bureau to work with the FBI to try to get to the bottom of the corruption allegations.

"There's no indication that anybody specifically is involved," Winget said. "We will approach it systematically, going through officer by officer until they identify any officer who may have had any connections.

"We are taking the approach that we do not make a decision based on one-sided accusations. Some accusations turn out to be true and some turn out to be baseless. We're determined to find out for sure which this is."

Both Keller and District Attorney Stewart Bell have pledged to get to the bottom of the allegations, which are coming from some of those arrested by FBI agents Oct. 9.

The FBI said it picked up word that "one or more individuals in the Clark County district attorney's office" also may have been compromised.

The six alleged associates of New York's Gambino crime family, including escort-service operator Christiano DeCarlo, remained in jail today without bond in connection with the plot to kill three of DeCarlo's rivals and take over the industry.

The six men are charged with conspiring to wrestle control of the outcall operations from Frank "Vince" Bartello, Richard Soranno and Harry Jacobs.

After the arrests of the suspects, agents found semi-automatic weapons, bullet- proof vests, silencers and a list of people believed to be targets in their possession.

Flynn, meanwhile, said law-enforcement authorities have been "extremely aggressive" in cracking down on the mob's activities here in recent years.

He attributed much of the success to Las Vegas FBI chief Bobby Siller, whom he said has encouraged an unprecedented era of cooperation with Metro.

"He believes in partnerships," Flynn said. "We probably work better now with the FBI than we ever have. We've never felt out of the loop during his tenure."