Former mob lawyer, councilman advance to runoff for Vegas mayor

Tim Dahlberg

Tuesday, May 4, 1999 | 9:50 a.m.

LAS VEGAS - Oscar Goodman, a lawyer who gained fame defending mobsters like Meyer Lansky and Tony "the Ant" Spilotro, was the top vote-getter in Las Vegas' mayoral election Tuesday, but fell just short of the majority he needed to avoid a June runoff.

Goodman, who came within 277 votes of an outright majority, will face veteran City Councilman Arnie Adamsen in the June 8 general election.

"We want the 'O,"' Goodman's supporters chanted as they watched him dominate the nine-candidate field.

"The Big 'O"' is one of Goodman's nicknames.

"I guess the public wants another month of this," Goodman said. "I can take another month of campaigning. I enjoy campaigning."

With all of the precincts reporting, Goodman had about 49 percent of the vote. Adamsen was second with 29 percent and developer Mark Fine was third with 16 percent.

"Our strategy has been a runoff and it looks like that's where we're headed," Adamsen said.

Goodman caught the public's fancy with a populist platform calling for developers to pay fees to help solve city traffic and air pollution woes. He was trying to succeed Jan Jones, who did not seek re-election.

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"I don't need this job. I want this job," Goodman said earlier. "There's a big difference."

The criminal defense attorney got rich defending the likes of Spilotro and Lansky. His entry into the race made it one of the most competitive - and certainly most expensive - in the city's 94-year history.

Polls leading up to the election showed the 59-year-old Goodman well ahead of Adamsen and Fine, who spent much of the campaign blaming each other for the traffic and growth that plague the booming Las Vegas Valley.

Goodman tried to take the high road, stressing his appeal as a populist candidate who can't be bought.

Adamsen, 49, a councilman for 12 years, portrayed himself as "Mr. Traffic Signal, Mr. Crossing Guard" in a campaign that focused on his experience at building a consensus at City Hall on major issues.

The Chamber of Commerce backed him, as did most every other sponsoring organization. Among them was the city's police union, which frowned upon Goodman's years of defending criminals arrested in Las Vegas.

"The contrast is experience and the type of experience we have," Adamsen said. "A criminal defense attorney verbally assaults people in court. Someone who has done that for 35 years would find it very difficult to provide consensus and move the city forward."

All three candidates spent more than $500,000 on the primary campaign, or more than one dollar for every resident of the city itself.

Fine spent his money touting his experience in developing the new master-planned communities that have sprouted in recent years on the fringe of the city as an example of what he would do if elected mayor.

Less than half of the 1.2 million residents in the Las Vegas Valley reside within city limits, and the huge megaresorts on the Las Vegas Strip are not part of the city either. The mayor's job, which pays $48,500 a year, carries little more clout than that of a city council member.