Vegas and the Chicago Outfit

The Skimming of Las Vegas

By: Al W. Moe

Narrated by: John Raynar

Length: 8 hrs and 2 mins

Publisher's summary

Chicago was the worldwide leader in gangster wars and bootlegging in the 1920s, as Al Capone set the stage for his tremendous success and popularity. When he was safely away in prison, the Chicago Outfit expanded into more rackets involving gambling and loan sharking, making bosses like Paul “The Waiter” Ricca and Tony “Joe Batters” Accardo rich beyond even Capone’s wildest dreams.

With prostitution and union corruption, Chicago had more bookies, card clubs, and clip joints than evil casino spots like Reno, Hot Springs, Toledo, and New York combined. So, they weren’t the first to find gold in Las Vegas, but they were sure good at draining the cash away once they tasted Sin City's pleasures and corruption!

For 40 years, Chicago led the way in untaxed and hidden money by skimming at often crooked games of no-chance. When Las Vegas jumped in the early ’40s, the Outfit’s interests in Las Vegas captured the Downtown area and went uptown to the Strip and the new Flamingo casino. To keep everything straight, Las Vegas imported known killers as local enforcers from the Outfit like Marshall Caifano and Tony “The Ant” Spilotro.Things went Chicago's way for decades as the Chicago Outfit drained hundreds of millions of dollars from a dozen Las Vegas casinos. How they did the deed right in front of the FBI, how it went untraced for decades, and how they moved the cash from the desert to places across the US and Europe is all right here in Vegas and the Chicago Outfit.

©2022 Al W Moe (P)2022 Al W Moe

Lots of info in short span.

Book gives lots of information in quick time. Got lost a few times keeping up with all the characters. Good book tho. Lot of interesting facts.

Quite a tour, far and wide, moves fast

This author has a conversational sort of style I find listenable, entertaining and enjoyable. It is colorful and moves through stories well. It is not the most disciplined, documented, traditional full-historian style. Some folks don't like the style. Sometimes the tone is a bit wisecrack. I don't mind. This story ranges into all areas (and families) across the USA, over many decades, as it swings in and of Vegas. If you are into this, many stories are familiar, a few not so familiar. But it ties a big picture together, quite well.

Truly Awful

10% of the story had actually anything to do with the Chicago skim and the rest were wildly tangential stories that barely (if at all) had anything to do with the topic. This is made worse by the author inserting sarcastic comments and rhetorical questions at the end of every paragraph, including a sarcastic reference to COVID.

This is all exasperated by the narrators inability to deliver the sarcastic comments as intended and just dead pans over them. How his mispronunciation of certain names and words made it past the editing department is baffling.

A good example of both of the author and narrator issues rolled into one is a section of the book that is given to recounting the life of Marilyn Monroe. This has absolutely nothing to do with the story of the mob in Vegas. This includes the famous quote in which Ms Monroe states that all she wears to bed is her perfume “Chanel #5” which the narrator mispronounces as Channel #5, although perhaps he thought she meant she sleeps with the television on.

I regret adding this to my library.

Dreadful

Snarky narration marred by mispronunciations. This story spent more time in New York and Cuba than Chicago and Vegas. Avoid this like like the clap.