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During the 1970s and into the mid-1980s, the dominant organized-crime family operating in Las Vegas hailed from Chicago. Known as the Outfit, they removed large amounts of money from the Sin City casinos they controlled before it was ever recorded as revenue. This particular form of theft was referred to as the “skim.” They also received income from street crime rackets such as burglary, robbery, and arson. This era was dramatized in the 1995 movie Casino.
Las Vegas law enforcement was aware of the mob’s presence and the need to rid the streets and casinos of its influence and corruption. But the two agencies with the primary responsibility of battling the criminals—the FBI and the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department—were experiencing their own difficulties. The feds had image problems due to agents accepting comped meals and shows from the casinos they were supposed to be monitoring. The Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department was sent into chaos in 1978 when FBI wiretaps recorded two of its detectives providing information to the mobsters. But changes were on the way.
The FBI began importing fresh troops from other offices to replace agents who were either reassigned or took early retirement as a result of the fallout from the comp scandal. And in November 1978, the voters of Clark County elected a new sheriff, a reformer who vowed to clean up Metro’s Intelligence Bureau and declared war on organized crime. It wasn’t long after the new sheriff took office in 1979 that the two agencies began to cooperate and launched a full-court press against their organized-crime foes.
Also in 1979, there was a personnel change on the criminal side. A career thief, arsonist, and killer from Chicago arrived in Vegas to take charge of the mob’s street crimes. That man was Frank Cullotta.
Cullotta had been invited to Sin City by the Outfit’s man on the scene, Tony “the Ant” Spilotro. Cullotta’s friendship with Spilotro dated back to their days as young toughs and thieves on the mean streets of the Windy City. His duties included assembling and overseeing a gang of burglars, robbers, arsonists, and killers. The crew Cullotta put together became known as the Hole in the Wall Gang, because of their method of breaking into buildings by making holes in the walls or roofs. In addition to stealing, the gang provided muscle in enforcement matters and otherwise did Spilotro’s bidding. For the next three years, Tony, Frank, and their crew ruled the Las Vegas underworld.
During that time the battle between law enforcement and the mobsters ebbed and flowed, with victories and setbacks for both sides and no apparent winner. But in 1982, a 1979 murder and a failed 1981 burglary contributed to a major turning point in the war: Frank Cullotta, Spilotro’s lifelong friend and trusted lieutenant, switched sides and became a government witness. Suddenly, the law had a source who not only knew the workings of the gang from the inside, but was willing to talk about it.
Having a cooperating witness with Cullotta’s knowledge could provide the government with the breakthrough it needed to bust the mob’s back, but only if his information was credible. It was a sure thing that any criminal defense attorney would challenge Cullotta’s veracity. It would certainly be brought out during any court proceedings that the government’s chief witness was a career criminal and an admitted killer, a man who had made a deal with prosecutors in order to obtain a lighter sentence. Under those circumstances, how much value would Cullotta actually be?
To address those issues, government lawyers decided not to use any information Cullotta imparted to them or their investigators as the basis for charges or in court, unless it was double- or triple-checked for accuracy. The man assigned the task of determining Cullotta’s truthfulness was Dennis Arnoldy, the FBI’s Las Vegas case agent for the Spilotro investigations.
For the next five years, Arnoldy debriefed the erstwhile gangster, obtaining the intimate details of life inside Spilotro’s crime ring, and transported him to appearances before various grand juries, courts, and commissions. During that time a personal relationship developed between the two men that continues today.
In my book The Battle for Las Vegas—The Law vs. the Mob, I told the story of Spilotro’s Las Vegas years primarily from the law-enforcement perspective. That book contained many insights that were disclosed to the general public for the first time. While researching Battle, I had the opportunity to talk with Frank Cullotta and became convinced that his life story would be a fascinating read and provide the other side of the Las Vegas mob story. It turned out that Frank had already been having the same thoughts.
Now, he has taken this opportunity to tell the tale. Some people, including his own brother and sister, might not be pleased to see it in print. But Frank believes that this is the only venue available to him to get his account on the record. In these pages, he discloses criminal activities for which he has either received immunity or the statute of limitations has long since expired. The story takes the reader beyond Battle and into the often dangerous, sometimes humorous, but always exciting real-life world of cops and robbers.
This book is by no means an attempt to make excuses for Frank’s conduct. He did what he did, he is what he is. It’s highly unlikely that this straight-from-the-shoulder account of his career as a criminal will make him a candidate for sainthood.
The story begins with Frank’s early years growing up in Chicago, where he embarked on his decades-long career as a criminal. As Frank advanced from juvenile crimes into burglary and armed robbery, he met and became friends with other hooligans, one of whom was Tony Spilotro. The two men again joined forces in Las Vegas, where Frank was Tony’s main man.
Although Spilotro got most of the notoriety, it will become clear here that Frank was an accomplished criminal in his own right. He planned and carried out the most daring robberies and burglaries committed by the Hole in the Wall Gang. In addition to thieving, Frank and his crew served as Tony’s enforcers, shaking down bookies and drug dealers and plotting or committing murders.
To get a feel for the two men and their relationship, Frank relates some of their individual and joint escapades in Chicago, including the true circumstances behind the so-called M&M murders. The movie Casino contains a scene based on those killings, in which actor Joe Pesci’s character places a man’s head in a vise and squeezes until the victim’s eye pops out.
Next Frank takes us to Las Vegas and tells the real story of life inside Spilotro’s Sin City gang, their battles with the law, and why he switched sides. Dennis Arnoldy adds insights from the law’s perspective, providing the reader with the unique opportunity of examining specific events from opposing viewpoints.
If you’re a true-crime or organized-crime enthusiast, a Casino fan, or simply interested in Las Vegas history, I don’t think you’ll come away disappointed from reading Cullotta.
Denny Griffin
Las Vegas, March 2007