Supermob
Page 39
Regardless of the rubric, when a deal was eventually consummated, Korshak's bills were discreetly mailed from his brother Marshall's Chicago law office. Often he would get paid in cash or with barter—like new cars.
The Untouchable: Invulnerability in Sidney's Fortress
Local FBI man Mike Wacks recently recalled how he became aware not only of Korshak's Bistro companions, but also how Sidney represented virtual immunity from prosecution. "Supposedly, we never had enough PC [probable cause] to wire up the Bistro," said Wacks. "Korshak was real easy to pick up over at that restaurant because he would hold court there. If we weren't doing anything, we'd go over there and see who he was having lunch with. He had the same corner booth. He had a certain time. And it was always there for him. As a matter of fact, when wre were in there one time, he was using the phone on the corner table and I said, 'God, I can't believe we couldn't get PC for this thing.' We couldn't. And this is one of the primary booths in the place. I can't even recall the exact guys who came in to see him, but they were righteous guys from Chicago, they were made members of the Mafia. It wouldn't be unusual for Sidney to meet with those guys or be seen with them, but he was Teflon. The police would identify these guys and they would go to Korshak, and Korshak would more or less tell them to pound sand—it was his business. He got away with it. Nobody ever questioned it. I mean, we questioned it, but we never could get anything going."40
Among other obstacles was Korshak's professional status. It seems that when Jake Arvey advised his wards to obtain law degrees, he was well aware of the ancillary benefits that particular sheepskin provided. Not only could their legal knowledge force the feds to play by the rules, which they often ignored, but with all their conversations with hoods protected by the attorney-client privilege, damning evidence was more deeply hidden than the proverbial needle in a haystack.
Chicago FBI agent Bill Roemer was one of many who understood the challenge represented in investigating Korshak and his ilk. "There was an FBI control file kept on Korshak: No. 92-789, the prefix designated racketeering and the last number was assigned sequentially," Roemer said in 1997. "To my knowledge, we never went out and conducted any real investigation on Korshak. We just never investigated lawyers in those days. The FBI was made up predominately of lawyers."41
Fran Marracco, wrho succeeded Roemer in the Bureau's Chicago Field Office, echoed his predecessor: "You can't run an OC [organized crime] case without running into cops and politicians. It is very hard to bring cases against them. So many people's jobs depended on them that you're not going to find witnesses. Nobody wants to torpedo their career."42
The sensitivity was no less apparent in Korshak's West Coast dominion, where A. O. Richards, an FBI agent from 1947 to 1977, hit the same Korshak brick wall in L.A. "He was almost an untouchable," Richards agreed. "You couldn't go after him, he was too well protected. Who would dare wiretap Korshak?"43 Some law enforcement professionals chalked up the inactivity to innocent bureaucratic difficulties. G. Robert Blakey, at the time an attorney in Bobby Kennedy's organized crime section of the Justice Department, said, "The legal problem of doing a direct investigation of a lawyer is a nightmare. A crooked lawyer in our society is almost beyond reach, the way it is organized today."44 Chicago-based U.S. attorney in the organized crime division David Schippers recently explained, "You need accountants to go through books. The FBI didn't have accountants. It was a matter of evolving. It took a long time for the FBI to adjust to it. It took the government a long time. It started in the thirties with gangsters, bank robbers. Officials were reacting to murders, violence. Then during the war, we're chasing spies. After that came Kefauver and then the rackets hearings. Then somewhere along the line you understand that politicians are in on this too. There are sweetheart deals here."45
RFK's Department of Justice colleague, Adai Walinsky, as noted, wrote off the official inaction to being merely a case of "investigative evolution"; 46 however, others weren't so forgiving of the feds' performance in relation to the Supermob. One senior FBI official in Los Angeles, who requested anonymity, cut to the chase, saying, "I think the Bureau was a little bit afraid of investigating Korshak because he had so many connections, and he was connected with so many top people out here in the movie industry. I think they were kind of afraid that if the word got out we were working a 92 case on him [organized crime investigation], all hell would break loose. It was the same way with Sinatra. I personally opened a 92 case on Sinatra. We just started to do a little bit on that and then the Bureau said to close the case."
Chicago's Fran Marracco agreed: "The Korshaks had connections in Washington. We were often cut off from pursuing them by headquarters. The U.S. Attorney's Office would just stall everything. They didn't mind if we went after some small-time local paisans. You're better off busting a bookie." As to exactly why headquarters would derail investigations of the Supermob, many point to J. Edgar Hoover's known friendship with the likes of Al Hart, the Korshaks, and other questionable operators. Attorney General Bobby Kennedy was likely torn because of his own family's relationship with the Korshaks in Chicago and Los Angeles.
Often, local FBI field agents took it upon themselves to monitor people like Korshak. Once, when Mike Wacks heard through an authorized wiretap of Allen Dorfman that Korshak, Dorfman, and Andy Anderson were to have lunch at the Bistro the next day, Wacks planned an eyeball surveillance. Posing as an insurance salesman, Wacks landed Table Four and overheard Korshak ask of Andy Anderson, "Have you got the money for Lou [phonetic]? I'm going to have dinner with him tonight." Anderson then handed Korshak a large envelope, which he immediately stashed in his inside coat pocket. Wacks was of the strong opinion that "Lou" was in fact Lew Wasserman, and that Anderson and Korshak were just doing business as usual, preventing Teamster strikes at Wasserman's Universal Studios.47 According to Wacks's memo memorializing the surveillance, Allen Dorfman showed up soon thereafter to join the party.48
There remained other agencies that could have pursued the Supermob, such as the newly established Organized Crime Strike Force. This group of regional Justice Department investigators was formed in 1966, but had a checkered history over the next two decades—again with little support from its Washington overseers. Marvin Rudnick, an attorney in the Los Angeles Strike Force from 1980 to 1989, recently described the workings of the unit: "The way this thing worked was that the Strike Force was made up of lawyers who specialized in complex litigation. Cases would be presented to us by the FBI, IRS, ATF, et cetera. And we would represent them in court. We wouldn't start our own investigations."49
But the Strike Force was likewise impotent in the face of Supermob associates like Sidney Korshak. L.A. FBI man Mike Wacks, who often turned such leads over to the Strike Force, recently described the problem: "The Strike Force was very reluctant because Korshak was an attorney. It was very hard back then to get wiretaps against attorneys. It was almost like an act of God. That would have been a wealth of information."50 L.A. Strike Force attorney Rudnick was also frustrated over the lack of official interest in Korshak et al. "There were no projects on Korshak that I'm aware of, and I'm a little surprised at that," Rudnick said. "We should have dealt with him, but we would have only dealt with him if the FBI dealt with him. To me, Korshak would have been the best target in town for organized crime prosecutors. I've been in L.A. for twenty-five years, and I've never seen where anybody has tried to take down that level of criminal. They took down the L.A. 'family' which was locally important, but that was it."
The situation was mirrored in the Strike Force's Chicago headquarters. David Schippers, who headed the Chicago Strike Force in the 1960s, remembered the obstacles. "Korshak was never on our radar because Teamster stuff was being handled out of Washington," Schippers said in 2004. "We were more interested in the Italian connections. So Korshak skated. He certainly had friends in Washington. When I first started with the Strike Force under Bobby Kennedy, I asked him, "What about Korshak?" He said, 'We're handling it out here [in
D.C.].' But Korshak had political ties everywhere, and he was nonpartisan."51 Fellow Chicago Strike Force member Peter Vaira agreed, saying, "The U.S. attorneys and the Strike Force were told to stay with the traditional gunslingers because the white-collar guys had political power."52 One could reasonably assume that the Labor Department would have had a serious interest in Korshak's Teamster (and other union) machinations. However, such was not the case. Chicago-based crime investigator for the Labor Department Tom Zander described his department's inaction: "We were told by the Washington office not to go after Korshak. 'You can't do that. That's it,' we were told. He must have had a connection in Washington, because such a thing wouldn't have been possible without it. He had contacts in the Illinois judiciary, federal, state—you name it."53
Things were no different for IRS investigators. Former IRS Western Region organized crime investigator Andrew Furfaro recalled, "We got zero support from headquarters. The local agents took it upon themselves to follow these guys, and we did. We sent our reports up the chain, but nothing ever happened. I'm sure political connections had a lot to do with it."54
With the federal elite showing little interest in Korshak, it was left to the state agencies to work his case. But they were similarly hamstrung, with no one really expecting local district attorneys to move against the Korshaks of the world. As Peter Vaira explained, "Most of the time, the local DAs don't
touch those cases—you get elected with fires, rapes, and murders." Connie Carlson, an investigator for the California State Attorney General's Office, was personally interested in the white-collar types like Korshak, Hart, and Ziffren. However, despite great leads and legwork, and after many years on the job, Carlson's tenure ended in frustration. "There was not enough manpower to prosecute these men," Carlson said. "The FBI wouldn't share their information with us, so we just hoped the IRS would get them."55
John Van DeKamp, L.A. district attorney from 1975 to 1983, and the state attorney general from 1983 to 1991, recently admitted his lack of interest in Korshak. "I don't remember any open investigations of Korshak, but his name just kept cropping up in all these labor settlements," Van DeKamp said. "I do not remember Korshak ever being a target of our office. The intel guys might have been interested, but it never got up to me, so they never made a case. There were rumors, and he was a mysterious figure." Interestingly, Van DeKamp readily admitted his friendship with Korshak pal Paul Ziffren: "When I first ran for Congress in 1969,1 was told that I should talk to Paul Ziffren, who gave me a little money to run. We were friendly over the years until he passed away."56
It has been alleged that Van DeKamp's friendships with the former Chicagoans and his concern with the political sensitivity of his office may have played a role in the scuttling of worthy cases. James Grodin, an organized crime investigator in Van DeKamp's office, was, like Carlson on the state level, frustrated by the lack of movement on the Chicago crowd. He was equally disturbed by what he saw as a wholesale trashing of good leads. "John Van DeKamp purged a lot of the DA's files," Grodin recently said. "I was warned in advance, so I copied some of mine before they were trashed. One night they came in with a dolly and carted off the file cabinets. Other DA's were even worse, and really did a number on the office's files."57
With Beverly Hills and the Bistro, Korshak had re-created not only a Lawndale-like, close-knit environment, but an establishment that mirrored his Chicago Pump Room "office." Korshak's daily appearances at the Bistro became so predictable that any absence became a cause of concern for owner Kurt Niklas. Once when Korshak failed to show for a few days, Niklas asked him, "Sid, where you been?"
"Sicily," Korshak replied.
Niklas then had the temerity to push the subject. "What the hell were you doing in Sicily?"
"Don't ask stupid questions!" was Korshak's terse answer.58
Just two days after the Bistro's gala November 1 opening, Korshak's world began to be rocked by a series of tragedies. On November 3, Sidney and Marshall lost their eighty-year-old mother, Rebecca, who had been living in Chicago's kosher nursing home, Alshore House.59 Not three weeks later, the Korshaks and most other Americans mourned the death of President Kennedy, gunned down in Dallas on November 22. Kennedy's assassination was likely more painful to the Korshaks than most due to the family's personal acquaintance with the Kennedy clan. But November held still one more misfortune for Sid Korshak: on November 30, Karyn Kupcinet, the troubled daughter of Irv Kupcinet, Korshak's longtime Pump Room companion, was found dead at age twenty-two in Los Angeles, where she was pursuing a career as an actress, and it is all but a given that Korshak had opened some doors for the aspiring movie star with his powerful studio friends.
Throughout much of her young life, Karyn had been obsessed with her body image, and her weight typified the yo-yo fluctuations that go hand in hand with diet-pill abuse. Although the coroner ruled the death a murder by strangulation, some have found errors in his work and believe the death to have been a suicide by overdose, especially when a recent ditching by her boyfriend is taken into account.
Ever the loyal friend, Sid Korshak hastened over to the morgue and identified the body, said Louis Spear, circulation manager for Kup's Sun-Times. "When Kup's daughter was killed, I had lunch with Sidney and the Beverly Hills police chief," recalled Korshak friend Leo Geffner. "He was pushing and urging them to conduct the investigation. Sidney offered to help out any way he could. He even offered to put up reward money."60 According to Kup's son Jerry, Korshak even offered to send his Chicago mob associates to L.A. to help find Karyn's alleged killer, if one in fact ever existed. Other sources noted that Sid later prevailed upon the local police to suspend the investigation, reasoning that it might dredge up information about her drug-abusing lifestyle that would be hurtful to Kup, who was said to have been suicidal himself over the loss of his beloved daughter.61
Although the year's final insult to Korshak's world did not involve him directly, few doubt that he counseled the victim, and it is known that his Supermob compadre Al Hart played a hands-on role in the affair.
On Sunday, December 8, Frank Sinatra's nineteen-year-old son, Frank Jr., was kidnapped at gunpoint in his Harrah's Lodge hotel room in Lake Tahoe, Nevada, where he was performing. The three young, bumbling kidnappers contacted Sinatra the next day and delivered their demand for $250,000 in ransom.62
According to concert promoter and celebrity photographer Ron Joy, who dated Frank's daughter Nancy in the sixties, Sid Korshak advised a distraught Frank senior to contact everyone's favorite banker, Al Hart, who had a penchant for laying his hands on quick cash.63 All day Monday and into the night, Hart oversaw the counting and photographing of $250,000 (minus $15 for a briefcase to carry it in).64 On Tuesday, Hart met Sinatra and the FBI at Korshak's Bistro at two in the afternoon, and after downing a stiff Black Jack, Sinatra proceeded to LAX for the payoff. On Wednesday, Junior was released in Bel-Air, and by Thursday the kidnappers were in jail.
The next day, Sinatra was back at the Bistro for his forty-eighth birthday. After everyone sang "Happy Birthday," Sinatra told Niklas, "I'm just glad it's over with. Gimme a shot of Black Jack."65
*Snowball was killed soon after President Nixon's 1969 inauguration by Attorney General John Mitchell. Mitchell explained his action by saying merely that the businessmen had promised never to do it again (Messick, Politics of Prosecution, 91). IRS agent Cesar Cantu added that the investigation had been extremely sensitive because of all the local Los Angeles politicians involved, and that the IRS later destroyed all of its records related to Snowball (Andrew, Power to Destroy, 142).
*Among those cheated were Harry Karl ($80,000), Tony Martin ($10,000), Zeppo Marx ($6,000), agent Kurt Frings ($25,000), Ted Briskin ($200,000), and actor Phil Silvers (undisclosed amount). Others lost even more.
*Wilder had garnered a staggering six Academy Awards and helmed such hits as TheLost Weekend, Sunset Boulevard, Stalag 17, The Seven Year Itch, Some Like It Hot, and The Apartment.
*Dick Brenneman
, who lunched with Korshak in 1976, recalled a similar Korshak nod to the importance of appearance, when Korshak proudly displayed a dazzling diamond on the little finger of his left hand. "Absolutely flawless, and the finest color," Korshak puffed. "It cost me sixty thousand, but I could sell it today for twice that."
CHAPTER 13
"He Could Never Walk Away from Those People"
Our state has become the favorite investment area of the veiled finance committee of organized crime.
— 1967 STATEMENT BY THOMAS C. LYNCH, CALIFORNIA ATTORNEY GENERAL1
BY THE MIDSIXTIES, the illegal bugs and wiretaps first installed under the Kennedy administration were beginning to bear fruit, especially in Las Vegas and the Supermob's Chicago homeland. The Bureau was finally starting to trace the movement of the Las Vegas skim through the underworld's key outposts, while learning the nuts and bolts of their extortion and racketeering games. In addition, Accardo, Giancana, Hoffa, and Korshak's key Outfit connection Humphreys were under constant physical surveillance and scrutiny, not only by the FBI, but by the IRS. Accardo, after receiving counsel from Humphreys and Korshak, barely escaped a 1960 conviction for income tax evasion; when Korshak entered Cedars of Lebanon Hospital in L.A. for a serious hernia operation, the feds listened from Chicago as Gussie Alex called to offer his sympathies.2 Korshak's Teamster ally Jimmy Hoffa was taking a particularly good beating in the courts, first indicted for receiving kickbacks from Teamster clients, then for jury tampering in the kickback trial. Giancana, who was pondering his second federal grand jury appearance in two years, called Sidney for advice from his suburban Armory Lounge headquarters on April 26, 1965.3 According to a Korshak friend who was also a Bureau informant, Korshak said that he tried to make a deal with the prosecutors "whereby Giancana can answer a few innocuous questions that would not hurt anybody" and result in Giancana's release from prison on his contempt of court charges (the Korshak ploy failed, however).4