What Happens to Chicago's Top Mob and Corruption Fighter After the Presidential Election?

Despite the national media's childlike fantasy that Illinois is something like Camelot—where the knights rise to power without staining their shining armor—we're still neck deep in corruption and sleazy pay-to-play politics.

The Chicago Outfit, though wounded, still reaches out to friendly pols. The bipartisan Illinois Combine that runs things isn't finished, though a Republican boss was indicted last week. The Democratic half of the Combine, Chicago's Daley machine, is now poised to leverage the awesome power of the White House. And what the machine wants is control of the federal hammer in its backyard.

Readers keep asking me the same question: Will the next president keep Patrick Fitzgerald as the U.S. attorney in Chicago?

I really can't say. What are political promises worth from politicians with debts to pay? But here's what I do know. There is no story more important to the people of Chicago and of Illinois than the future of Fitzgerald, who has systematically hunted down the corruption.

Corruption the Chicago Way doesn't only waste money and burden taxpayers. This isn't only about isolated instances of graft and amusing, earthy rapscallions. That is a cartoon. The reality is that Illinois political corruption is an infection that spreads. The people either are numbed and deny it, or they feel pressured to suck up to their overlords. That's not American. That's positively Medieval.

That's how important this is. Both John McCain and Barack Obama have promised to keep Fitzgerald here.

"If we lose him, we lose everything," said a Chicago FBI agent wise in the ways of Chicago politics and its symbiosis with the Chicago mob. "I can't imagine it happening. He's the guy who pulls the trigger on all these investigations. If it happens, if they get rid of him, forget it."

Fitzgerald, brought here as an independent with no political connections and no ambitions to run for governor or knock down seven figures at a law firm, has done more in a few years than could have been imagined.

A corrupt former Republican governor in prison. A Democratic governor with a creeping case of feditis that appears to be politically terminal. City Hall patronage bosses convicted. And the leaders of the Chicago mob are scheduled for sentencing in December, which means the Outfit is in no mood to play the enforcer for their favored politicians.

History shows us that governors are expendable, but mayors are not. In this city's fantastic history of corruption, a mayor has never gone down. Chicago mayors are like the queen bee, and all other bees protect her, because she lays the magic eggs. Without the eggs, what's the point of public service? After years of climbing, Fitzgerald is getting close to the hive.

McCain has no loyalty to the Republican half of the Combine, which backed Mitt Romney, who made it clear he would dump Fitzgerald if elected. But McCain was unequivocal in his support for Fitzgerald and said the prosecutor should remain where he is, fighting political corruption in Illinois, not promoted up or out.

"I'd keep him. I'd keep him," McCain said last November when I asked him at a session with the Tribune's editorial board, of which I am not a member. "I think he has done a good job and I think the American people are crying out for having this corruption cleaned up."

Obama, meanwhile, talks reform. But he's backed by the Chicago machine. And Obama's own longtime friend and real estate fairy, Tony Rezko, has been convicted of corruption and is believed to be preparing to talk to the feds.

Mayoral brother Bill Daley has been rumored for a Cabinet post in an Obama administration, and is expected to be on the transition team if Obama is elected. Bill Daley will look to protect his brother first. Although Bill is a thoughtful politician, somehow I just don't see the phrase "Barack, we've gotta keep Pat Fitzgerald" on Billy's lips in the personnel meetings.

Another Chicago connection, U.S. Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-Tomczak), is being rumored as a possible White House chief of staff. Emanuel would also look first to protect the mayor. Washington Beltway reporters won't tell you this, because they must figure that what happens in Chicago stays in Chicago, but a few years ago, Emanuel was elected with the help of a massive patronage army of stooges on the City Hall payroll who pounded the precincts.

The fellow who directed this army for Emanuel is the corrupt former city water boss Donald Tomczak. He now sits in federal prison in Duluth, Minn., while Emanuel prepares to reform us all. It was Fitzgerald's office that put Tomczak away.

Back in March, Obama visited the Tribune's editorial board. He said that if elected president, he would keep Fitzgerald in place.

"I still think he's doing a good job," said Obama. "I think he has been aggressive in putting the city on notice and the state on notice that he takes issues of public corruption seriously."

Does your wanting to keep Fitzgerald in the job threaten any other political entities here in Chicago?

"I can't speculate on that," Obama said then. "I can't."

But you can.

Thanks to John Kass

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Was Frank "Lefty" Rosenthal a Snitch?

Back before he was mayor of Las Vegas, when he was the city's leading mob attorney, Oscar Goodman insisted he didn't represent snitches.

He represented Frank Rosenthal. Now that Rosenthal is dead, three former law enforcement sources with first-hand knowledge confirmed what was long suspected. Lefty Rosenthal was an FBI informant, whether his attorney knew it or not.

While Rosenthal was alive, no one would confirm it. Nobody wanted to be the one who got Lefty whacked. After he died of a heart attack in his Florida home Oct. 13 at the age of 79, it is confirmed Rosenthal was a "top echelon" informant, someone with firsthand knowledge of the top ranking mob bosses.

Rosenthal's code name was "Achilles," one source said. Was it a sly reference to the handsome Greek warrior who was invincible except for his heel? Or was he simply a heel? Sure beat the code name his mob buddies used when discussing him -- "Crazy."

I couldn't confirm exactly when he started informing to the FBI, but the relationship was lengthy and useful. His information helped the FBI develop a lot of organized crime and casino skimming cases.

Rosenthal was an informant even before the 1982 bombing of his Cadillac outside Tony Roma's restaurant on Sahara Avenue, one source said. After the bombing, the FBI tried to convince Rosenthal to enter the Witness Protection Program, but he refused.

Later, he told the Chicago Tribune he rebuffed the offer to become a federal witness. "It's just not my style. It doesn't fit into my principles." Instead, in 1983 he left Las Vegas, which had been his home since 1968, moving first to California, then Florida.

"He talked about everything and everyone, whether he had first-hand knowledge, like he did at the Stardust, or second- and third-hand knowledge like at the Tropicana," one source said.

Nobody had a definitive answer as to why Rosenthal would become a Chatty Cathy.

One source said Rosenthal was an expert handicapper. "He was a smart guy, he could see people were going down. As an oddsmaker, this was his chance to bet both sides of the game."

A second source said it was speculation, but "he may have felt he needed a way out at some point, and he knew cooperation was one way to get out."

Rosenthal was from Chicago, but since he was Jewish, he wasn't a made member of the Chicago Outfit, but he was a close mob associate. From childhood, he was friends with another mob watchdog, Anthony Spilotro, which ended with Spilotro's affair with Rosenthal's wife, Geri, the tale fictionalized in the movie "Casino."

When the mob needed someone to watch over its Las Vegas casino interests, Lefty was the man. From 1974 until 1979, San Diego businessman Allen Glick was the casino owner, but Rosenthal, despite his ever-changing titles, was the smooth operator.

Although federal officials claimed millions were skimmed from Glick's casinos, Rosenthal was never indicted. Nor did he testify against Midwest mob leaders as Glick did during the trial in Kansas City, which ended with mob boss convictions in 1986.

Las Vegas was an open city for the mob. No one organized crime family controlled all the casinos; different families shared the booty. The Chicago mob through the Argent Corp. had a foothold in the Stardust, Fremont, Hacienda and Marina.

The Tropicana was the playground of the Kansas City mob.

The boys in Detroit staked out the Aladdin.

The Dunes had ties with St. Louis mobsters.

Milwaukee bosses arranged for Glick's $62 million in loans from the Teamsters Union pension funds to buy Las Vegas hotels, then insisted Glick hire Rosenthal.

The indictments were many, so were the convictions. Despite the extensive wiretapping, Rosenthal was never charged, even though authorities described him as the man who "orchestrated the skim at the Stardust."

Inevitably, some of his buddies figured he wasn't charged because he was informing on them to the FBI. The late Joe Agosto -- entertainment director at the Tropicana and the Kansas City mob's guy on the scene -- was wiretapped in 1978 telling a Missouri mobster Rosenthal was "a snitch" who would "bite the hand that feeds him."

In John L. Smith's book "Of Rats and Men," Goodman said Kansas City mobster Nick Civella thought Rosenthal had become too friendly with the FBI. Civella called Goodman, his own attorney, and asked whether Rosenthal was crazy, apparently a code term for untrustworthy. "No, I don't think he's crazy," Goodman answered. "If I had agreed with Civella, Rosenthal would have been killed. I didn't know it at the time, but I apparently saved his life," Goodman told Smith.

Goodman started representing Rosenthal in 1971 after Rosenthal was indicted on illegal betting charges. In 1975, a Las Vegas federal judge dismissed the indictment against him, saying the wiretap was illegal and should have been an investigative tool of last resort.

That same year, Sheriff Ralph Lamb submitted an affidavit to help Rosenthal restore the rights he lost after pleading no contest in North Carolina to trying to change the point spread for a college basketball game with a bribe in 1960. The sheriff said he had known Rosenthal for five years and "he has evidenced the highest integrity and his reputation for truth and veracity in the Las Vegas community is unexcelled. Mr. Rosenthal is among the most respected persons in the Las Vegas gaming community."

Contrast that with Glick's Kansas City trial testimony 10 years later about a 1974 meeting with Rosenthal in the Stardust coffee shop. Glick said Rosenthal told him: "You're not my boss. And when I say you're not my boss, I'm talking not just from an administrative position, but your health. If you interfere with what's going on here, you will never leave this corporation alive."

As one of the recipients of the Rosenthal Glare, I can vividly imagine how those words were delivered.

Goodman represented Rosenthal for decades, fighting to keep him licensed to operate the Argent casinos. Higher courts ultimately overturned Rosenthal's victories in lower courts. Gaming regulators put him in the Black Book.

Throughout his life, Rosenthal denied being an FBI informant, but said it wasn't for want of trying by the FBI.

In 1976, Rosenthal told gaming officials that in 1960, when he was working in horse racing in Miami, J. Edgar Hoover sent an agent who asked him to provide information about gambling throughout the country. He said the agent promised him "near total immunity, except murder."

In 1977, he claimed he was the victim of harassment because he refused to supply information to the FBI.

As recently as 2006, when asked why he never snitched, Rosenthal said, "It all comes down to style and doing what you feel comfortable with. I never talked about or testified against anyone and never will."

He may not have testified, but he definitely talked.

As far as Goodman not representing snitches, one knowledgeable source said, "I think he represented more than one, whether he was aware of it or not."

Thanks to Jane Ann Morrison

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Attorneys Disqualified from Organized Crime Bombing Case

A federal judge disqualified two lawyers Tuesday from representing a pair of defendants charged in a mob-related case with blowing up a coin-operated amusement company in suburban Berwyn.

Judge Ronald A. Guzman disqualified attorneys Alexander Salerno and Edmund Wanderling, saying they have "numerous and multifaceted" conflicts of interest.

Mark Polchan, 41, and Samuel Volpendesto, 84, are charged in the February 2003 bombing that ripped apart the Berwyn offices of C&S Coin Operated Amusements.

Prosecutors say the blast was a message from the mob to the company to quit horning in on its $13 million monopoly on gambling in Chicago's western suburbs.

The two men were arrested July 30 when federal agents fanned out across northern Illinois, raiding offices and hangouts of the Outlaws motorcycle gang. Polchan is a member of the Outlaws. The two have pleaded not guilty.

A call to Salerno and Wanderling at their offices late Tuesday was not immediately returned. A message was left with their answering service.

Salerno showed up at the home of an unnamed mob member who could become a defendant in the case when federal agents searched it on July 30, Guzman said. Wanderling apparently called Salerno and urged him to go to the home, he said.

Salerno also represented a key witness in the case and Wanderling had represented that witness's son, the judge said. He said Salerno previously served as an attorney for Volpendesto, who is now represented by Wanderling.

"These circumstances make it extremely difficult for the court even to admonish adequately Volpendesto or Polchan as to the many different ways that this prior relationship could result in prejudice to either during the course of these proceedings," Guzman said in a 15-page written opinion.

"Under these circumstances it is extremely difficult for the court to satisfy itself that either Volpendesto or Polchan understand fully the consequences of waiving their Sixth Amendment right to effective assistance of counsel," he said.

Thanks to Mike Robinson

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Bonanno Crime Family Associate Convicted

Earlier Monday, after a two-week trial, a jury convicted JOSEPH YOUNG of the March 29, 2005 murder of Robert McKelvey, racketeering, and numerous other crimes of violence.

The convictions were announced by Benton J. Campbell, United States Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, and Mark J. Mershon, Assistant Director-in-Charge, Federal Bureau of Investigation, New York Field Division.

As established at trial, JOSEPH YOUNG was an associate of the Bonanno Organized Crime Family of La Cosa Nostra, and was assigned to a Staten Island-based crew led by Bonanno soldier, Gino Galestro. Galestro ordered the murder of another associate in the crew, Robert McKelvey, in order to punish McKelvey for openly boasting of the crew’s criminal activities, and YOUNG agreed to do the murder in exchange for $10,000. On March 29, 2005, another associate of the crew lured McKelvey to a meeting at the historic Kreischer mansion in Staten Island, where YOUNG lived and worked as the mansion’s caretaker. When McKelvey entered the foyer of the mansion, YOUNG stabbed him. McKelvey escaped through the front door, and was tackled by YOUNG, who dragged McKelvey to a decorative garden pool in front of the mansion and drowned him. Following the murder, YOUNG and three associates of the crew disposed of McKelvey’s body by dismembering it with hacksaws, burning the pieces in the mansion’s furnace, and discarding the remaining ashes and bone fragments in the mansion’s septic tank system. Pursuant to searches of the septic tank and wooded area around the mansion, the FBI and personnel from the Medical Examiner’s Office of the City of New York recovered bone fragments and personal effects of McKelvey, and a spot of McKelvey’s blood was recovered from the stairs leading to the mansion’s basement.

In addition to the McKelvey murder, the jury convicted YOUNG of the following additional crimes of violence:

• the summer 2005 attempted arson of a vehicle whose owner had crossed Galestro;

• the September 2005 gunpoint robbery of the Pine Tree Holistic Center, an illegal massage parlor in Springfield, New Jersey, where YOUNG’s girlfriend worked at the time;

• the October 20, 2005 gunpoint extortion of an individual who owed tribute money to Galestro’s crew;

• the January 27, 2006 arson of a home in Staten Island while the residents were asleep inside, one of whom suffered a near-fatal heart attack while attempting to fight the fire;

• the autumn 2005 conspiracy to rob a pizza parlor in Coram, New York, by gunpoint;

• the May 12, 2005 assault in aid of racketeering of a mechanic who was a business rival of other mechanics connected to the crew; YOUNG and another member of the crew assaulted the mechanic at his place of business using a police-issue baton and a crowbar, resulting in a broken knee cap and other serious injuries; and

• the July 1, 2005 gunpoint carjacking of a BMW at the Menlo Mall in Woodbridge, New Jersey.

In addition, YOUNG was convicted of purchasing two firearms through false statements, and then obliterating the guns’ serial numbers and illegally transporting them from Pennsylvania to New York.

Galestro previously pled guilty to racketeering charges that included the McKelvey murder.

“We are gratified with the jury’s thoughtful and considered verdict in this case. The mafia continues to commit unspeakable acts of violence in our community, and we will not rest until we bring the criminals who commit those acts, including murder, to justice,” said United States Attorney Campbell.

FBI Assistant Director-in-Charge Mershon stated, “Once again the popular misconception of a more genteel and nonviolent mob is put to lie. Today’s La Cosa Nostra families may devise some schemes that are more sophisticated than their ancestors’. But they still commit murder and mayhem.”

YOUNG faces a mandatory minimum sentence of life imprisonment when sentenced Allyne R. Ross, United States District Judge, on January 27, 2009.

The government’s case is being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorneys Winston Y. Chan, Jack Dennehy, and William Schaeffer.

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Rumors of the Kennedy Family's Ties to the Mafia

Rumors of ties between the Kennedys and the Mafia go back to John F. Kennedy’s father, Joe Kennedy, who reportedly earned much of the family fortune as bootlegger and had connections to mobsters like Meyer Lansky. When JFK faced Hubert Humphrey in the Democratic primary in 1960, many claimed that the Kennedy clan called on their mob connections to ensure a favorable vote, and similar accusations were made during the presidential election against Richard Nixon, which Kennedy won by a slim margin.

Several theories tie JFK’s assassination to the Mafia. Jack Ruby, the man who murdered Lee Harvey Oswald (JFK’s accused assassin), was a known mob associate. One theory attributes motive to the Mafia through the Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba. The Mafia reportedly hated that Cuba was in the hands of Fidel Castro, who had thrown them out of their lucrative Cuban casino businesses when he came to power. The invasion was an utter failure attributed by some to Kennedy’s refusal to approve air support.

Another theory points to JFK’s brother, Robert, whom JFK appointed to the position of attorney general after he was elected president. Once appointed, Robert Kennedy immediately began a Mafia crackdown. Robert also died from an assassin’s bullet.

Another rumor plays on suggestions that JFK kept several mistresses and girlfriends, some of whom were known to associate with mobsters. Some evidence, including federal wiretaps, shows that mobster Sam Giancana may have set JFK up with various women, all the while recording proof of the President’s extra-marital affairs. Conspiracy theorists have speculated that it was hit men sent by Giancana who murdered Marilyn Monroe, one of JFK’s supposed girlfriends. Giancana himself was murdered shortly before he was due to testify on the Mafia/Kennedy connections.

Thanks to Nicks Free Info

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