Vol. 3, No. 17
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July 1, 2006
Nevada's Online State News Journal
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Feature Story:
Who Can We Blame For Today's Tolerant Drug Culture?
Who Is Responsible For Corrupt Politicians, Judges, Law Enforcement?
by Johnny Gunn
During the last few weeks there have been major drug busts in northern and southern Nevada, police agencies throughout the state have reported increases in gang activity, the judicial hierarchy in southern Nevada has been ruthlessly excoriated by the Los Angeles Times, and Mr. Cool still pumps his weekend nose candy while the Cool siblings smoke their pot, oblivious to the fact they are responsible for the entire mess.
That's a relatively strong statement, but because of the unique part Nevada plays in the realm of major crime organizations, it's good old Joe Cool who pumps the organ and at the same time is the stupid animal that dances to the organ's tune. According to international criminal investigators, the only place in the world where it is easier to launder great sums of cash is the Orient. And the gambling houses in Asia that come under scrutiny most often are related in some way to those found in Nevada. International criminal elements depend on Nevada's open and tolerant way of life to protect them. Law enforcement at the upper end seems to be just as tolerant of certain criminal activity. There is more to what we think of as criminal activity than robbing, killing, abusing drugs, running stop signs.
Drug importation is the driving force in crime families and syndicates, and money buys the protection they need. Corrupt politicians, investigators, judges are just pawns to be used. Nevada during the last 140 years has had its share of all of the above. According to some, corruption in politics is tolerated in Nevada because of the old Wild-West mentality that if it doesn't affect me personally, then who really gives a damn.
Drugs are the driving force in organized crime today and the distribution of drugs generates huge amounts of cash, cash that must be laundered before it can be used. Nevada's casinos have often been portrayed as a revolving door for a flood tide of cash, coming in tainted, going out clean. The big boys in organized crime play with a touch of sophistication; they set up their rivals and kill or eliminate only the target. Usually. But at the bottom end of the feeding chain, the gang bangers have no sophistication; the killing is random, often not even a specific target. Gang activity has increased as the summer season begins and this is bothering police agencies all across the Silver State.
Methamphetamine labs are not as big a threat on the local scene as they were just a year or two ago, and have been replaced by international distribution syndicates along the same lines as cocaine and heroin dealers. In Nevada law enforcement is willing to say that as much as 70-percent of the crime they investigate is meth driven. Methamphetamine use is so widespread that most crime begins with its use.
The $kindustry in Las Vegas is believed to be at the heart of some of the syndicates, particularly the ones with ties to La Cosa Nostra. Vast sums of cash are generated by the clubs, far more than just what a naked lady might bring, and while some of that money is distributed to corrupt politicians and judges, most must be laundered before it can be used to fund the national and international network of criminal activities.
An international drug ring with roots in Las Vegas was broken up during the middle of June by DEA and FBI agents. It is believed that the group was responsible for bringing well over 500 pounds of heroin into the country during last few years. Drugs are usually distributed by the gram. There are 28 grams to the ounce and 16 ounces to the pound. You do the math. In northern Nevada a Mexican drug ring was broken up netting several hundred pounds of meth and almost $300,000 cash.
In crime as in business, money is power and power is reserved for winners. In the criminal world those that make lots of money either use or buy losers as was seen recently in the Mike Galardi criminal corruption trial. Lance Malone was found guilty in San Diego, California of the same charges he will go to trial over next month. He is a loser and was used by Galardi. Clark County Commissioners were bought, and used by Galardi.
What the trial magnified, and Clark County officials have failed to follow up on, is the vast amount of ready cash Galardi had at his disposal. Naked ladies doing erotic lap dances can't possibly generate the kind of cash that Galardi seemed to fling about with total abandon. One real shame is the fact we don't get to sit through a trial for Rick Rizzolo. The felon copped a plea and we don't get to know whether or not any more political hucksters are serving us by taking our tax dollars along with their graft.
Can southern Nevada's $kindustry be tied to the international drug syndicates? Can Nevada's abundant number of corrupt politicians be tied to international crime lords? The old adage is a good one that Nevada's upper echelon crime fighters don't seem to want to use: Follow The Money. Two busts, one in Las Vegas nets several hundred pounds of heroin, one in northern Nevada nets several hundred pounds of methamphetamine, each creating vast amounts of cash. The drugs arrived from Mexico and South America. Nevada is a major part of the international pipeline.
Chinese crime lords have been arrested recently while attempting to launder Asian crime money through Nevada's casinos. It was reported that more than $2 million was deposited at the Rio Suite Hotel and Casino's Hong Kong office, supposedly to be transferred to Las Vegas, then once made clean, brought back to Asia. Asian criminal sources allegedly deposited well over $100,000 at the Paris Las Vegas Casino while a $1 million check from Asian crime lords was made out to Caesars Palace. There is an on-going federal investigation into these allegations.
In one indictment that has been issued, federal authorities claim a quartet of Las Vegas and Las Vegas owned Asian casinos was used as a conduit for Chinese racketeers to embezzle funds into the U.S. Money laundering is the key to discovering who is behind the vast drug importation and distribution network that seems to have Las Vegas as at least a hub in their wheel.
What is obvious is there is a tremendous demand for drugs across the country. Methamphetamine today is looked on as being the most devastating to the user and to those close to the user such as family and employers. Local police have done a very good job of closing down the small-time meth labs in Nevada although many police believe there are still producing labs operating. Federal laws controlling the sale of some over the counter medicines have shut off the availability of the drug's precursors, but that porous border between Mexico and the U.S. is allowing thousands of pounds of meth to come into this country, some say daily.
In the two most recent raids in Nevada, almost 1,000 pounds of highly valuable drugs, about half was heroin were seized. Heroin has not been in the center of the sights for some time, overtaken by meth and cocaine, but the southern Nevada bust proves it is still a viable moneymaker for the criminal. Transportation into this country is most easily accomplished on the Mexican border, but drugs from other areas usually arrive by airplane. Even with the much more strict airport security in effect following 9-11, the drugs seem to flow in unhampered. It's what happens after the illicit merchandise arrives that creates so much problem for local police. Distribution is often handled by local gangs. And gang warfare is breaking out across Nevada.
A gang member's mentality is not that of a business person handling hundreds of thousands of dollars in merchandise, rather what is seen put in that context would be the manager of a fast food restaurant walking next door and killing the manager of a competing fast food restaurant. Gangs only think of protecting their turf, killing others that might wear the wrong color shirt, abusing anyone that attempts to infiltrate their particular system. In the criminal world, gangs are the bottom feeders, and they seem to be proud of that.
Clark County Sheriff Bill Young has said he feels there are about 6,000 gangs operating in southern Nevada, and to make things worse gangs from southern California, Arizona, and Mexico come to Las Vegas regularly, particularly on the weekends. They come for the same reason other tourists come; make a killing. When members of two gangs end up in the same place at the same time, generally someone dies. That happened in Laughlin just a few years ago when members of the Mongols and Hells Angels, two motorcycle gangs known for their drug distribution came together in Harrah's Casino.
In the first five months of this year according to Sheriff Young 117 gang shootings have taken place in Clark County. In all of 2005 there were 220 gang-related shootings. Police throughout the country are finding that younger and younger people are becoming gang members and are willing to kill those that infiltrate their turf.
Some police agencies, including those in Nevada are finding the youngest members of gangs are the children of gang members. This has been known in southern California for years. Numbers of gangs and gang members are also climbing because of the large numbers of new comers to southern Nevada. The problem isn't limited to Las Vegas of course. Sheriff Neil Harris in Elko County has been fighting an uphill battle with methamphetamine labs and users for years.
Harris believes part of the problem is the wide-open spaces. Someone can set up a lab in an abandoned mine shack somewhere, and nobody will even know they are there. Distribution is a bit easier for the same reason, he believes. Large numbers of young people, that demographic most often found to be abusing meth work in the mines in eastern Nevada. The companies have severe rules concerning drug use, but there is always a way around, Harris believes.
And this leads us right to Joe Cool and his oh so Cool family. Throughout this country millions of people snort a bit of cocaine once in a while, their kids think it's so cool to smoke a bit of dope now and then, and according to education specialists, youngsters in grammar school are checking out the effects of methamphetamine. Like father like son, like mommy like daughter. And they are too wrapped up in doing something illicit they don't even recognize what it is costing them.
Sure, one can buy some snorting coke or some pot for pocket change today, but what about the court costs involved in the racketeering case against the corrupt politicians that that pocket change bought? How many cops got shot at by the gang banger that sold the stuff? How many extra cops had to be put on the payroll because of the gang activity around the neighborhood? How many family members will never have a daddy because he walked down the wrong street in the wrong turf?
One final question that might make a difference: What is the tax the weekend drug abuser pays in his town or city to keep it safe from those that sell that stuff? It's the taxes, and most believe the cost one pays when combined with the cost of the dope is more than one can calculate, even when not in that drug induced haze.
The money that buys corrupt politicians and judges, the money that pays for thousands of extra cops around the state, the money that gets laundered and sent somewhere to purchase more corruption seems to originates with that local street corner gang banger that Joe Cools buys his stuff from. And in Nevada's major counties, the highest level of law enforcement has not called for grand jury investigations of where it all has come from, where it all is going.
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