Organized Crime Control Of Gay Bars

[derzauberberg]

This topic was tangentially referenced in the Stonewall Inn thread on this board, but I think it deserves its own message topic for a full discussion. I have done a great deal of research on the history of gay bars, and was surprised to learn of the significant role of organized crime -- particularly the Genovese and Gambino crime families -- in the ownership and operation of gay bars. See http://www.bitterqueen.typepad.com/

I fully understand why organized crime originally ventured into the gay bar industry because of the fact that being gay used to be illegal, and by offering payoffs to the police the Mafia was able to keep bars open. However, gay bars have been legal since 1967, and I don't understand why the Mafia continues to have interests in at least some gay bars in cities such as Chicago, New York and Montreal. The press and insider accounts provide ample support that organized crime has maintained its interests in at least some gay bars in some American cities throughout the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s if not through the present.

What saddens me is that the Stonewall Inn riots -- widely regarded as the rallying cry for the modern gay rights movement -- specifically were a protest against Mafia control of gay bars as much as a protest against police harassment of gays and lesbians. However, I am not sure that we as a gay and lesbian community have successfully eliminated organized crime from our bars, and I don't understand why law enforcement continues to allow the mob to exploit our community. In some instances the Mafia has used its control over at least some gay bars to blackmail closeted gay men and as distribution centers for illegal drugs. Organized crime is not a friend to the GLBT community, and eliminating the Mafia should be a central issue on our civil rights platform.

To what extent does organized crime maintain an interest in gay bars in America, and what should we as the GLBT community do about it?

[meegbear]

1. I will check out your link ...

:party: WELCOME TO DU!! :party:

[derzauberberg]

2. Thanks

Thanks for the welcome to DU, meegbear, and I hope that you do check out the link.

One thing in particular about organized crime control of gay bars that stands out to me is how even after the Stonewall Riots in June 1969, organized crime became very violent to maintain its control of gay bars in New York City. Gay people tried to own some gay bars in the 1970s, and many of them were murdered by the Mafia. The NYPD was investigating organized crime control of gay bars from 1975 to 1977 in connection with several unsolved homicides of gay men who tried to own bars and clubs but "top brass" at NYPD nixed the investigation -- known as Operation Together -- over the protests of the Assistant District Attorney and the two NYPD detectives assigned to the case. The investigation was closed just as arrests and indictments against organized crime were imminent, and the ADA subsequently resigned and the two detectives were re-assigned to lousy positions for complaining about the abortion of the project that finally would have eliminated the role of the Mafia in gay bars. This particular link has more details about the issue: http://bitterqueen.typepad.com/history_of_gay_bars_in_ne/2007/12/investigation-o.html

Just recently I filed a Freedom of Information Act request with the New York County District Attorney's Office for documents in connection with Operation Together, and I was told in writing that notwithstanding the homicides at issue all are unsolved the NYDA's office inexplicably no longer is in the possession of these files, and otherwise has no idea what happened to them or where they are. Moreover, the NYDA's office told me that it has no information at all concerning organized crime control of any gay bars in New York City at any time. Why is it that the New York Times has so much information about the issue but the NYDA's office has none? Is it indifference? Incompetence? Corruption? The people of NYC should be very concerned about the efficacy of its law enforcement system.

[readmoreoften]

3. Can we limit this discussion to specific locations?

Just because the NY mob families have a hold on some gay bars--or even most gay bars--in NYC doesn't mean that every gay bar in America is mob controlled. If it's an issue that needs to be addressed, it should be addressed in an inflammatory way that insinuates the mob and the queer community are somehow interlinked. Considering all the outrageous bullshit thrown at us and the fact that we're attached to every act of evil on the planet (including Nazi Germany) let's be VERY SPECIFIC when addressing this. I seriously doubt this is a widespread problem off the East Coast.

[BillSam]

4. I don't think the OP

is trying to link the mafia with gay people. He's just concerned about the mafia's possibly continuing exploitation of gays, and curious about mob influence over gay bars in some cities.

You're probably right that most gay bars are not mob-controlled, and certainly right that those that may be mob-controlled are limited to large cities like New York. But I think it's a fascinating issue, and what's wrong with shedding a little light on it?

If you check out the blog the OP links to, you'll see that it does cover specific cities, not the nation as a whole.

[readmoreoften]

6. I'm not worried about the OP. I'm worried about creating a new angle for RW freaks.

If the mafia is controlling our bars, then we should most certainly address it and the OP certainly seems to know what he's talking about. I only want to make sure we're really careful how we talk about it so that it doesn't easily become a manufactured RW talking point. As a union member, I've seen organized labor be treated as if it were synonymous with organized crime simply because the mafia, for a period in history, was able to hijack the aims of working people via a few corrupt bosses. We're already blamed for everything else under the sun, so I just want us to be very specific in how we discuss the problem, so that we don't give the RW another bizarro talking point. Of course, I think it would be a hard sell, though, for RWers to connect the mob and "teh gay". They sort of hero-worship the mafia as an uber-hetero construction (just a little too workin' class for their tastes...) I don't think conjoining "gay" and "mafia" would fit in easily with either of their stereotypes.

But just in case...

[zbdent]

9. didn't Rudy single-handedly run the Mafia out of New York? According to his own PR ...

same as Ahnold single-handedly "terminating" the California deficit ...

[LostinVA]

10. Yes, they are -- this is a cross posting from GD

Where, the purpose of the thread was both to do this AND to get around the GDP rules and slam Hillary Clinton. It was posted yesterday.

[derzauberberg]

5. Good Point

ReadMoreOften, you do make a good point. And from my research of organized crime control of gay bars, I do want to highlight that the West Coast -- Cali, OR, and WA -- historically have not had Mafia influence in the gay bars even at a time, and in Texas the Mafia has not historically been involved in gay bars. However, in cities where the Mafia traditionally has been strong -- such as NY, Chicago, Kansas City, Rochester (NY), Boston -- unfortunately organized crime has exploited the gay community both pre- and post-Stonewall Inn.

Moreover, you make a good point, too, that not all gay bars in cities such as Chicago and NY are controlled by the mob. Indeed, not all pizza parlors in NY are controlled by the Mafia notwithstanding that famous "pizza connection" case in NY in the mid-1980s where the mob was using pizza shops as fronts for heroin trafficking. However, some gay bars are controlled by the Mafia, and some pizza shops are controlled by the Mafia.

However, there no doubt is mob control of some gay bars in some American cities, and this is not a function of the queer community being linked to the Mafia but of the Mafia exploiting us just as it exploits many other groups. My point in raising the issue is that many gay men have been victimized by the mob, and four decades after the Stonewall Riots we no longer should have to put up with its shit.

[readmoreoften]

7. I'm all for getting rid of the mob in our NY and Chicago (etc.) bars...

I'm guessing that the connection stemmed from needing protection from police in an era when police wouldn't protect us and/or entrenched mafia presence in the neighborhoods where the bars are. I imagine both can feed off one another. I could see how in the 70s and early 80s (what with all the extreme police corruption in the urban northeast) the bar owners might've needed to buy protection from the mob, then once they established the area as 'their turf', new bar owners were forced into making arrangements with the mob because the need for the mob in the area (due to police corruption and refusal to protect us) created a stronghold for them. If this is the case, then I can imagine it might be tough even today to get rid of them.

The mafia become less powerful when police actually serve and protect (and also when society isn't so prohibitive that normal life is outside the law.)

Belated welcome to DU! :hi:

[derzauberberg]

8. Here's A Republican Who Owns Both Straight Strip Joints AND Gay Bars!

From Today's Atlanta Constitution-Journal:

They step and contort to thumping music and jumpy lights, perched atop platform heels better gauged in altitude than inches. They open three-song sets in lingerie and end them in a lot less. The women, hundreds of them, parade across Jack Galardi-owned stages around the country . . . . * * * Welcome to Galardi Nation, a smoky, windowless empire that stretches like a plus-size G-string from Nevada to Florida to the Carolinas, at times numbering two dozen clubs. Five operate in metro Atlanta, including the just-opened Pink Pony South, in Forest Park, with its two-tier showroom and upstairs sushi bar. While his dancers are on full display, the 76-year-old Galardi remains one of the most successful and controversial local moguls you've likely never heard of. * * * Galardi was convicted in 1972 of stealing blank money orders and cashing them on the overseas black market. He served about six months in prison on a five-year sentence. Since then, prosecutors and police investigators have claimed he was involved in drug trafficking with the head of a Nevada motorcycle gang, ignored prostitution at his clubs and associated with organized crime. But Galardi has never been charged with crimes related to those accusations. * * * He's gone broke twice and amassed a large, if indeterminate, fortune ("I don't have as much money as Turner," he smiles). He has four kids and two ex-wives. He's run gay bars, country bars, biker bars. * * * From 1967 through 1972, Galardi was either on the move or cooling behind bars. He promoted an all-girl rock band on military bases across Vietnam (his one-word explanation: "Divorce"); opened a club in Alaska; and was convicted of stealing blank money orders from two U.S. post offices in California. The money orders were cashed, through someone else, for more than $160,000 on the black market in South Vietnam. * * * Galardi moved to Las Vegas with a new wife and stepson and continued bar building. He got into strip clubs when he bought one that had been owned by a former nightclub partner of his in California. The club became available after the man's severed head turned up in the desert. * * * Galardi Nation has taken hits. The most public came in 2003, when Galardi's estranged stepson Michael, a club partner, pleaded guilty to bribing officials in Las Vegas and San Diego. He's serving a 30-month sentence in federal prison. "Mike wouldn't listen to me," says Galardi, never charged in the two-year FBI investigation.

See http://www.ajc.com/business/content/business/stories/2008/02/23/galardi_0224.html#

[LostinVA]

11. Yay -- the troll is gone!

This freak called me Fred Phelps twice yesterday.

I wonder who their NEW sockpuppet will be?????