The Kennedy Brothers: The Rise and Fall of Jack and Bobby (59 page)

51
  Quoted in Collier and Horowitz,
The Kennedys,
p. 162.

52
  Ralph G. Martin,
Seeds of Destruction: Joe Kennedy and His Sons
(New York: Putnam, 1995), p. 210.

53
  Interview, Barry M. Goldwater.

54
  Kennedy,
The Enemy Within,
p. 35.

55
  Ibid., p. 88. The story was recounted by Scott to Kennedy investigator Walter Sheridan.

56
  Schlesinger,
Robert Kennedy and His Times
, p. 179.

57
  Hoffa’s account is contained in Arthur A. Sloane,
Hoffa
(Cambridge: MIT Press, 1991), p. 28.

58
  Nick Thimmesch and William O. Johnson,
Robert Kennedy at Forty
(New York: W. W. Norton, 1965), p. 73.

59
  Sloane,
Hoffa
, chap. 11.

60
  Quoted in ibid., p. 60.

61
  
Newsweek,
8 April 1957, p. 36.

62
  Kennedy,
The Enemy Within
, pp. 74-75.

63
  Ibid., p. 62.

64
  Schlesinger,
Robert Kennedy and His Times
, p. 173.

65
  “The Rise of the Brothers Kennedy,”
Look,
6 August 1957; “The Kennedy Brothers: Off to a Fast Start,”
U.S. News and World Report
, 12 April 1957; “Young Crusader: He’s Making the Spot Hot,”
Newsweek,
22 July 1957; “Young Man with Tough Questions,”
Life
, 1 July 1957.

66
  Kennedy had been briefed in preparation for Marcello’s testimony by Aaron Kohn, a former FBI agent whose life’s work was to track Louisiana’s “Little Man.”

67
  Kennedy,
The Enemy Within,
p. 75.

68
  Ibid., pp. 249-50. Gallo and his brother, Lawrence, were credited with no less than seventeen hits by this time. When Kennedy asked him about one in which the victim’s face had been shot so many times he was unrecognizable, Joey Gallo simply giggled.

69
  Ibid., p. 160.

70
  Quoted in Schlesinger,
Robert Kennedy and His Times
, p. 172.

71
  Timmesch and Johnson,
Robert Kennedy at Forty,
pp. 24-25.

72
  Parmet,
Jack
, pp. 424-37.

73
  
Arizona Republic,
21 January 1983, p. 3.

74
  Mahoney,
JFK: Ordeal in Africa
(New York: Oxford University Press, 1983), pp. 20-24.

75
  Quoted in Schlesinger,
Robert Kennedy and His Times
, p. 206.

76
  Parmet,
Jack,
pp. 417-31.

77
  Thompson and Myers,
The Brother Within
, p. 25.

78
  Kennedy,
The Enemy Within,
p. 325.

79
  Quoted in Ralph G. Martin,
Seeds of Destruction
(New York: 1995), p. 217.

80
  Martin,
Hoffa
, p. 142.

81
  See p. 171, Kennedy,
The Enemy Within
. Confidential interview: 37. A committee investigator commented that RFK’s “recharacterization” of Teitelbaum’s offer was very different in its original iteration by the gangster lawyer.

82
  Interviews, Goldwater, O’Donnell. Kennedy’s account in The
Enemy Within
is on p. 171.

83
  Costello and Giancana’s relationships with Joseph Kennedy are set forth in the “February 29, 1960, New York City” chapter. Moe Dalitz, a brilliant Jewish gangster from Detroit, was involved with Kennedy in bootlegging during the 1920s and in 1950 opened the Desert Inn in Las Vegas, thereafter becoming one of the most prominent mafiosi in Las Vegas. Interview, Dean Elson, FBI Special Agent in Charge in Las Vegas, 1961-1969.

84
  JFK at mass with Battaglia is cited in Anthony Summers,
Official and Confidential: The Secret Life of J. Edgar Hoover
(New York: Putnam, 1993), p. 269. Summers cites FBI files at p. 489 of his book as the source. The Battaglia fund-raiser is cited in the JFKL PPP, 1960 election, Arizona file. Also Joseph Bonanno,
A Man of Honor: The Autobiography of Joseph Bonanno
(New York: Simon and Schuster, 1983), p. 114.

85
  Quoted in David E. Scheim,
Contract on America: The Mafia Murders of John and Robert Kennedy
(Silver Spring, MD: Argyle Press, 1983), p. 171. Nixon’s Mafia ties were wide-ranging: Bebe Rebozo and James Crosby in south Florida, Carlos Marcello in New Orleans (a heavy Nixon contributor), C. Arnholt Smith and John Alessio in California, as well as Teamster mob chieftains like Anthony Provenzano. The
Los Angeles Times
tided a lead editorial on Nixon’s Mafia and Teamster ties during his presidency: “Nixon, the Teamsters, the Mafia,” 1 June 1973. Jack Halfen was a prominent Texas gangster until his conviction for income tax fraud in 1954. In prison he talked to U.S. Marshal J. Neal Matthews and told him that the mob had given LBJ $500,000 in cash and campaign contributions while Johnson was in the Senate. Halfen had pictures of himself and Johnson as well as a letter from LBJ to the Texas Board of Paroles. According to LBJ biographer Robert Caro, Johnson as congressman, senator, and vice president received “envelopes stuffed with cash” from lobbyists.

The Campaign: 1960

1
  Personal memo from J. Edgar Hoover to the attorney general, 16 August 1962. The memo states: “Before the last presidential election, Joseph P. Kennedy (the father of President John Kennedy) had been visited by many gangsters with gambling interests and a deal was made which resulted in Peter Lawford, Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin and others obtaining a lucrative gambling establishment, the Cal-Neva Hotel, at Lake Tahoe.”

2
  Charles Rappleye and Ed Becker,
All-American Mafioso: The Johnny Rosselli Story
(New York: Doubleday, 1991), p. 202.

3
  Leonard Katz,
Uncle Frank: The Biography of Frank Costello
(New York: Drake Publishers, 1973), pp. 68—69. Costello related details of his relationship with the elder Kennedy to noted journalist Peter Maas, among others.

4
  FBI telex LA 92—113, “Background on Hoodlum John Rosselli,” July 1961. Rosselli unofficially managed the Tropicana in Las Vegas in the late 1950s, in which Costello had a major interest. See also Sam and Chuck Giancana,
Double Cross
(New York: Warner Books, 1992), pp. 228—29. I am grateful to the Chicago Crime Commission for its assistance in my research.

5
  Interview, Mario Brod. In addition to top-secret spot work (such as structuring retainers for defecting Soviet spies in Manhattan), Brod also represented the Teamsters. See Tom Mangold,
Cold Warrior: James Jesus Angleton: The CIA’s Master Spy Hunter
(New York: Simon and Schuster, 1991) and Dan E. Moldea,
The Hoffa Wars: Teamsters, Rebels
,
Politicians, and the Mob
(New York: Paddington Press, 1978). In interview, Brod described himself as “no particular friend of the Kennedys” and did not recall who in particular had invited him to the lunch.

6
  Edna Daulyton, a hostess at Young’s that day, in an interview with Anthony Summers, recollected a far larger gathering of gangsters, including Carlos Marcello, who is known to have contributed $500,000 to Vice President Richard Nixon in 1960 and supported Senator Lyndon Johnson in the primary against Kennedy. See Summers,
Official and Confidential,
p. 269.

7
  Interview, O’Donnell.

8
  LBJ’s ties to Marcello through Bobby Parker, his chief aide when he was Senate majority leader, went back to the early 1950s. Marcello’s Texas “political fixer” Jack Halfen reportedly arranged to siphon off a percentage of the mobster’s racing wire and slot machine profits for LBJ’s Senate campaigns. Journalist Michael Dorman alleged that in exchange for such contributions, LBJ stopped anti-racketeering legislation. After becoming president, Johnson ordered all FBI bugging (principally of the Mafia) to cease. Part of the reason may have been that a Senate investigation of Bobby Baker’s corruption was leading directly to mob connections. Special Agent Willliam F. Roemer Jr., who had been spearheading the attack on the mob in Chicago, concluded: “If you judge a man by his acts, here was a man [LBJ] who did more to hinder the government agency fighting crime than any other president or leader in our history.” William F. Roemer Jr.,
Roemer: Man Against the Mob
(New York: Ballantine, 1989), p. 218. See Dick Russell,
The Man Who Knew Too Much
(New York: Carroll & Graf, 1992), p. 524. Nixon’s friend Bebe Rebozo was a well-known figure in various mob families. Among other things, Rebozo arranged the purchase of Nixon’s Key Biscayne property through a corrupt series of financial maneuvers. See Warren Hinckle and William W. Turner,
The Fish Is Red: The Story of the Secret War Against Castro
(New York: Harper & Row, 1981), pp. 296—98.

9
  Confidential interview with a former employee in Kennedy’s Manhattan office who worked for Steve Smith during the 1960 campaign characterized Joe Kennedy’s comment in these words. Regarding Nixon’s mob ties, see John H. Davis,
Mafia Kingfish
(New York: McGraw-Hill, 1989), pp. 360—66.

10
  See Michael R. Beschloss,
Kennedy and Roosevelt: The Uneasy Alliance
(New York: W. W Norton, 1980).

11
  Truman later said that he had replied: “If you say another word about Roosevelt, I’m going to throw you out the window.” See Parmet,
Jack
, p. 141. Also quoted in Merle Miller,
Plain Speaking: An Oral Autobiography of Harry S Truman
(New York: Berkeley Books, 1974), p. 186.

12
  Arthur Schlesinger Jr. makes reference to this practice as well in
Robert Kennedy and His Times
, p. 61.

13
  Paul Fay,
The Pleasure of His Company
(New York: Harper & Row, 1966), p. 27.

14
  Miller,
Plain Speaking,
p. 187.

15
  Interview, Kenneth O’Donnell. Kennedy had first recounted the spoof at a Gridiron Club dinner in March 1958. See Box 900, PPP, JFKL.

16
  Parmet,
Jack,
p. 511.

17
  See Memorandum from Jerrold B. Brown to Inspector General, CIA. Background on Jim Angleton’s Call to Senate Committee Counsels, July 1975. Assassination Archives (AA), Church Committee files.

18
  For fuller portraits of Accardo and Humphreys, see Roemer,
Roemer: Man Against the Mob
.

19
  Seymour M. Hersh,
The Dark Side of Camelot
(New York: Little, Brown, 1997), p. 143.

20
  This description of Rosselli draws on the magisterial book by Rappleye and Becker,
All-American Mafioso
.

21
  FBI telex 2162,10 March 1960, at The National Archives in Suitland, Maryland, has a multibox file spanning fourteen years regarding Rosselli.

22
  FBI memorandum, THP, “Background on Johnny Rosselli,” 19 July 1960, FBI numbered files, AA. Carmen is quoted in Rappleye and Becker,
All-American Mafioso
, p. 209.

23
  Peter Collier and David Horowitz,
The Kennedys: An American Drama
(New York: Summit Books, 1984), p. 284. The author’s judgment regarding the state of Robert Kennedy’s knowledge of his father’s and brother’s sexual indiscretions is drawn from numerous interviews with family friends.

24
  Kennedy interviewed Edmund Notti, then Las Vegas assistant city manager and later assistant clerk of Cook County (Illinois). The testimony of Notti, who later described himself to FBI agents as a friend of Rosselli’s, can be found in FBI numbered files, July 1962, AA.

25
  See the
World Encyclopedia of Crime
, pp. 1894—97, for background on Lansky. Also Rappleye and Becker,
All-American Mafioso,
pp. 139—40.

26
  Interviews: Robert R. Fuesel, former IRS Treasury agent (Criminal Investigation Unit, Chicago) and president, Chicago Crime Commission, and Peter McClennen and Robert Rose (Chicago political consultants). The Chicago Crime Commission granted the author access to its immense files. See also Ovid Demaris,
Captive City
:
Chicago in Chains
(New York: Buccaneer Books, 1993).

27
  Interview, Brod. Humphrey’s characterization of the exchange was not entirely accurate. Kennedy asked, after Giancana laughed at one of his questions, if he was “giggling. I thought only little girls did that, Mr. Giancana.”

28
  This is consistent with Giancana’s reported reasoning for supporting JFK in Giancana and Giancana,
Double Cross
, p. 280.

29
  According to Kitty Kelley in her unauthorized biography of Frank Sinatra, FBI wiretaps revealed that Skinny D’Amato claimed that he had distributed $50,000 for Jack Kennedy in the West Virginia primary.
His Way
(New York: Bantam Books, 1986), pp. 295, 581. In
The Dark Side of Camelot,
Seymour Hersh disputes this based on his interviews with Milton Rudin, a Los Angeles attorney who represented Sinatra and other entertainment figures. D’Amato moved mob cash from Las Vegas directly to the Kennedy campaign. This conforms with Brod’s recollection. According to Hersh’s account, D’Amato, bragging about his role in the campaign, was picked up by an FBI bug. He was subsequently indicted on income tax evasion charges by the Justice Department, an action concerning which Rudin approached Steve Smith (pp. 100-101).

30
  This account is essentially drawn from interviews with Larry O’Brien and Kenneth O’Donnell as well as Theodore White’s
The Making of the President 1960
(New York: Atheneum, 1961), pp. 78—95.