Born on June 12, 1929, was American professional sports bettor, former Las Vegas casino executive, & organized crime associate, Frank "Lefty" Rosenthal. Rosenthal was born in Chicago, Illinois
- mobtalk247
- Jun 12
- 6 min read
Born on June 12, 1929, was American professional sports bettor, former Las Vegas casino executive, & organized crime associate, Frank "Lefty" Rosenthal. Rosenthal was born in Chicago, Illinois, in a Jewish family and grew up in the city's West Side. As a youth, he learned sports betting in the bleachers of Wrigley Field & would often skip classes to attend Chicago sporting events. Rosenthal's father also owned racehorses, whereby he became familiar with betting odds & percentages at a young age. By the mid-1950s, Rosenthal was working with the Chicago Outfit. Chosen for his expert odds-making ability, he ran the biggest illegal bookmaking office in the United States on behalf of the Mafia, specifically the Outfit. Based in Cicero, Illinois, under the guise of a home improvement company, Rosenthal & the Outfit bought "contracts" to fix sporting events. After being indicted as a conspirator on multiple sports bribery charges, Rosenthal moved the operation to North Bay Village in Miami, Florida, to avoid attention.
By 1961, Rosenthal had acquired a national reputation as a sports bettor, oddsmaker, & handicapper, & in Miami he was frequently seen in the company of prominent Outfit members Jackie Cerone & Fiore Buccieri. At this time Rosenthal was issued with a subpoena to appear before U.S. Senator John McClellan's subcommittee on Gambling & Organized Crime, accused of match-fixing. He invoked the 5th Amendment 37 times & was never charged. Due to this, Rosenthal was barred from racing establishments in Florida. Despite his frequent arrests for illegal gambling & bookmaking, Rosenthal was convicted only once, after pleading no contest in 1963 to allegedly bribing a New York University player to shave points for a college basketball game in North Carolina. He was also a suspect in multiple business and car bombings in the greater Miami area during the 1960s. It was at this time the FBI opened an ongoing case file on Rosenthal, which amassed 300 pages. In order to once again escape police attention, Rosenthal moved to Las Vegas, Nevada, in 1968.
A big promoter of sports gambling, Rosenthal secretly ran the Stardust, Fremont, Marina, & Hacienda casinos when they were controlled by the Chicago Outfit. He also created the 1st sports book that operated from within a casino, making the Stardust 1 of the world's leading centers for sports gambling. Another Rosenthal innovation was hiring more female blackjack dealers, which in 1 year helped double the Stardust's income. In 1976, the FBI & Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department (LVMPD) discovered that Rosenthal was secretly running 4 large casinos without obtaining a state gaming license, holding a hearing to determine his legal ability to obtain a license. The hearing was headed by Nevada Gaming Control Board Chairman (future U.S. Senator) Harry Reid. Rosenthal was denied a license because of his arrest record & his documented reputation as an organized crime associate, particularly because of his boyhood friendship with Chicago mob enforcer Anthony “Tony The Ant” Spilotro. Rosenthal married Geri McGee on May 4, 1969. McGee already had a daughter, Robin L. Marmor, from a previous marriage with ex-husband Lenny Marmor. Rosenthal & McGee later had 2 children together, Steven & Stephanie. There were infidelities on both sides, with McGee secretly having an affair with Tony Spilotro. The marriage ended in divorce in 1981, with Rosenthal attributing the failure primarily to McGee's inability to escape her dependence on alcohol & drugs. After leaving Rosenthal & stealing a portion of his savings, McGee died at a motel in Los Angeles on November 9, 1982, at age 46, of an apparent drug overdose. Her death was ruled accidental, from a combination of Valium, cocaine, & alcohol.
On October 4, 1982, Rosenthal survived an assassination attempt in Las Vegas, in which a bomb attached to the gasoline tank was detonated when he started his car. While Rosenthal had dined at the Tony Roma's restaurant at 620 E. Sahara Avenue, a person or persons unknown placed the bomb in his car. Rosenthal likely survived, because of a manufacturing device unique to his particular model car (a 1981 Cadillac Eldorado): a stout metal plate under the driver's seat, installed by General Motors on all El Dorado models, to correct a balancing problem. This plate shielded Rosenthal's body from most of the explosion's force. Although no 1 was ever charged for this murder attempt, Milwaukee mob boss Frank Balistrieri was possibly responsible. Balistrieri, who was known as the "Mad Bomber" to law enforcement, was heard (via wiretap) blaming Rosenthal for the legal problems the mob-controlled casinos were suffering. Similarly, just weeks before the bombing, Balistrieri told his sons he intended to get "full satisfaction" for Rosenthal's perceived wrongdoing. Other likely suspects include Kansas City mob bosses, who were recorded on an FBI wiretap tape calling Rosenthal "crazy"; Tony Spilotro, either acting with others or on behalf of the Outfit; & outlaw bikers who were friends of Rosenthal's ex-wife, Geri McGee.
Rosenthal left Las Vegas about 6 months later, & moved to Laguna Niguel, California. He focused on raising his children, who were both accomplished youth swimmers. Tony Spilotro & his brother Michael disappeared on June 14, 1986, after they drove away together from Michael's Oak Park home. Michael's wife, Anne, reported both brothers missing on June 16. Michael's car, a 1986 Lincoln, was recovered several days later in a motel parking lot near O'Hare International Airport. On June 22, their bodies were found, 1 on top of the other & stripped down to their undershorts, buried in a cornfield in the Willow Slough preserve near Enos, Indiana. The freshly turned earth had been noticed by a farmer who thought that the remains of a deer killed out of season had been buried there by a poacher, & he notified authorities. An autopsy completed on June 24 identified their cause of death as blunt force trauma, & ascertained that they had been dead since June 14. They were identified by dental charts supplied by their dentist brother, Patrick Spilotro. The 2 were buried in a family plot at Queen of Heaven Cemetery in Hillside, Illinois, on June 27. In January 1986, in the wake of the imprisonment of Joseph "Joey O'Brien" or "Joey Doves" Aiuppa & John “Jackie The Lackey” Cerone for skimming Las Vegas casino profits, a meeting was held at the Czech Lodge in North Riverside, Illinois. Most of the 'upper echelon' were there, including Outfit boss Tony "Joe Batters" Accardo. Accardo decided to appoint Samuel "Black Sam" or "Sam Wings" Carlisi as the "Street Boss" in charge of Outfit operations, to replace Joseph Aiuppa. Carlisi told the group that Accardo would stay on as consigliere & would have final say, as well as Gus Alex staying head of the connection guys. He then went on to the 1st problem: Spilotro, & how things had gone down since he took over Vegas. Mobster & mob enforcer Rocco Infelice said, "Hit him." Everyone else at the meeting agreed. Spilotro was replaced in Las Vegas by Donald "The Wizard of Odds" Angelini.
Lefty Rosenthal was later formally banned from Las Vegas casinos in 1987, when he was placed in "the Black Book", making him persona non grata, unable to work in, or even enter, any Nevada casino because of his alleged ties to organized crime. But in June 1990, Rosenthal won an unprecedented court ruling to have his name removed. Rosenthal was represented in the hearing by future Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman. Goodman & Rosenthal lost, however, in the Nevada Supreme Court in 1991, & Rosenthal's ban was reinstated. Rosenthal later moved from Laguna Niguel to Boca Raton, Florida, where he ran a sports bar called "Croc's", & finally to Miami Beach, where he ran a sports betting website & worked as a consultant for several offshore sports betting companies. Rosenthal died on October 13, 2008, at the age of 79, of an apparent heart attack. After his death, it was disclosed by Las Vegas Review-Journal reporter Jane Ann Morrison that Rosenthal had been a top echelon informant for the FBI, & his wife Geri was also an FBI informant. No arrests were made in Spitoro murders, until April 25, 2005, when 14 members of the Chicago Outfit (including reputed boss James Marcello) were indicted for 18 murders, including the Spilotros'.
Martin Scorsese's film Casino (1995) is based on the Las Vegas careers of Spilotro & Rosenthal, on whom the characters Nicholas "Nicky" Santoro (played by Joe Pesci) & Ace Rothstein (played by Robert De Niro) were based. Nearing the end of the film, Nicky & his brother Dominick (Philip Suriano), based on Tony's brother Michael Spilotro, are shown being beaten with metal baseball bats & buried alive in an Indiana cornfield by their associate Frank Marino (Frank Vincent), based on Frank Cullotta, & the rest of Nicky's crew.
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