JFK and Giancana

 JFK and GIANCANA

When I first learned that they were making a major motion picture about Sam Giancana's role in the assassination of President Kennedy I wrote a quick piece on the essence of the CIA-Mafia plots to kill Castro, that include Giancana as a primary player and are intimately entwined in what occured at Dealey Plaza.

[  Posted at http://JFKCountercoup2.blogspot.com  /     JFKCountercoup2: Sam Giancana    ]

Now I realize that the Giancana-JFK story is much more convoluted and deserves deeper background to fully appreciate.

Giancana enters the story in my book in Atlantic City, New Jersey in May, 1929, when he served as a minor delegate of the Chicago contingent at the conference of organized crime mobsters from around the country.

The ostensible occasion was to celebrate the marriage of Meyer Lansky, the accountant of the Lucky Luciano-Bugsy Siegel gang out of New York, who grew up together as youngsters.They were among the Young Turks who were waiting in the wings for the old school Mustache Petes to fight it out among themselves. 

But the St. Valentine's Day Massacre had called attention to the mob wars and brought heat down on all the mobsters. 

The meeting was called for by Luciano, and Atlantic City was chosen because it was tightly controlled by Enoch "Nucky" Johnson, who had the law in his pocket and ensured the mobsters they wouldn't be hassled. 

Racket bosses from every major city in the country were there, and while they didn't meet together in the then new Boardwalk Convention Hall, they did meet privately, took rides on the wicker walkers and walked on the beach where their conversations were drowned out by the breaking waves.

The main topics were Capone, and how to end the mob warfare.

Capone was there, but after the press learned that, he went into hiding, leaving his hotel and holding out in the locker room bar at the Atlantic City Country Club on the mainland, where there is still a locker with Capone's name on it. 

It was decided that Capone had to do some time in prison, or they all would, and so he agreed to take a train to Philadelphia where he was met at the station by a friendly policeman he knew, turned over his pistol and arrested on a minor weapons charge. Sentenced in court he was sent to Holmesberg prison, where he was afforded the luxury of a radio, cigars, booze and food delivered from local restaurants. Holmesberg is now a tourist museum. 

As for the inter-mob warfare, they decided to form a board of directors who would settle disputes among the mobsters, mainly over territory and booze. Luciano was named chairman of the board, and besides the heads of the five New York families, Philadelphia, Chicago, New Orleans, Tampa, and Havana would be included. Chicago would represent everything west of the Mississippi. 

Foreseeing the eventual end of prohibition, it was decided, at Lansky's suggestion, to get into gambling in a big way. Lansky bribed the sheriff of some counties in Florida and opened some casinos there, but also made a deal with Cuban dictator F. Batista, to open casinos in major hotels in Havana.

While some say Giancana met old man Joe Kennedy, Sr. during their bootlegging days of prohibition, Kennedy wasn't a bootlegger. He owned the liquor companies, primarily Canadian whiskeys and Caribbean rum, and sold them to Giancana, the bootlegger.

They also could have met each other when Kennedy had a part ownership of the Cal-Neva Lodge, a large bar, restaurant, hotel and casino built on the California border with the casino on the Nevada side and situated in Northern Nevada near Lake Tahoe.

Giancana and Frank Sinatra later took control of the Cal-Neva Lodge and at Sinatra's suggestion, brought in Paul "Skinny" D'Amato to run the casino.

D'Amato owned the popular 500 Club in Atlantic City where he brought in top flight Vegas acts to perform, including Sinatra, who, as a close, personal friend, didn't charge Skinny. 

By the 1950s, Giancana not only ran Chicago, but took over Luciano's place as chairman of the board of the Syndicate, as it came to be called. It also included Angelo Bruno of Philadelphia, Russell Bufalano of Northeast Pa., (As portrayed in Scorsese's The Irishman), Carlos Marchello of New Orleans and Santo Traficante of Tampa and Havana. 

All of the Syndicate board members had pieces of the casino action in Florida, Havana, and Las Vegas, where Bugsy Siegel made his name and paid for it with his life.

Havana was the big money maker, until Fidel Castro threatened the casinos and mobsters by ousting Batista, who fled Cuba on New Years eve 1959.

Lansky saw it coming however, and sold his interests in one casino a few months earlier to one of JFK's golfing buddies Mike McLaney and Carrol Rosenbloom. 

Around the same time Senator John F. Kennedy was running for president and was supported by his good friend Frank Sinatra, who was also pals and Cal-Neva business partner with Giancana. 

While Mayor Daley and Giancana are credited with delivering Illinois to JFK in the general election, Giancana played a more pivotal role in the key West Virginia primary, that gave the Democratic nomination to JFK. 

Kennedy had to win the predominantly Protestant state, and Giancana and D'Amato helped him do it. The West Virginia Sheriff's Association held their annual convention in Atlantic City and patronized D'Amato's 500 Club, so Skinny knew them well enough to deliver suitcases full of cash for them to spread around and grease the election for Kennedy. 

At the Democratic National Convention that year, besides nominating JFK and putting LBJ on the ballot as VP, it was also decided to hold the 1964 Convention in Atlantic City.

Sinatra put the entertainment together for JFKs inaugural ball, and was looking forward to doing the same at the 1964 Convention in Atlantic City when JFK was expected to be renominated. 

In the meantime however, Sinatra introduced Giancana and JFK to the vivacious Judyth Campbell who had amorous affairs with both men, at the same time. She visited the White House on occasion, and met JFK at his New York City hotel suite. She delivered packages and messages between the two men. 

That is until the FBI director J. Edgar Hoover decided to blow the whistle on the menage a tois, informing Attorney General Bobby Kennedy of the arrangement, and suddenly Campbell and Sinatra stopped getting their White House invitations. 

On a side bar, as the FBI stakeout squad kept an eye on Judy Campbell's Vegas apartment, they watched two men break in to it when she wasn't there. They were identified as the Hale twins, sons of a high level FBI official I.B. Hale, so nothing was done. 

The Hale twins attended Arlington Heights high school in Ft. Worth, Tx, with fellow student Lee Harvey Oswald, at least for one semester until Oswald was of legal age to drop out of school and enlist in the US Marines. 

With JFK dead, and LBJ president, the 1964 Democratic National Convention in Atlantic City was a bland affair. As LBJ was paranoid that RFK was tapping his hotel phone, he moved into the Margate beach side home of Carroll Rosenbloom, the owner of the Baltimore Colts and former Havana casino owner, who later died suspiciously. 

LBJ was afraid RFK's name would be placed in nomination and he would steal the nomination, so RFK's speech in tribute to JFK was placed last of the agenda. He received a rousing long applause and gave a stirring speech. 

And Sinatra performed at "the Five," as the locals called the 500 Club, for the last time. 

When Skinny D'Amato died Sinatra served as a pall bearer at his funeral. 

( More to come - photos and links to be added - stay tuned.)