John Buntin. L.A. Noir: The Struggle for the Soul of America’s Most Seductive City. New York: Harmony Books, 2009. 409 pages.
In this lengthy exposition of Los Angeles police and corruption, John Buntin examines the career of two Angelenos: Bill Parker, who became one of the LAPD’s most important–and controversial–chiefs, and Mickey Cohen, who occupied a similarly influential position in the city’s criminal underworld. Buntin positions the men as bitter enemies, structuring the book with alternating chapters (for the most part) charting the me n en route to their inevitable collision course. But while neither man liked the other, and both’s paths crossed several times, they weren’t really destined to clash in a final, terrible battle. Cohen ultimately went to jail for tax evasion, not for any crime that Parker’s LAPD had investigated, and Parker was more seriously threatened by larger social problems (chiefly LA’s changing demographics and larger social issues that led to an increase in crime) and interdepartmental and city-level political sniping. So the set-up, while well-executed, eventually rings false, as neither man figures heavily in the demise of the other. Nor did they have, it seems, a truly personal antipathy. Cohen would have been harassed by any LAPD chief who wasn’t on the take, and Parker attempted to crush criminal kingpins, subversives, and garden-variety criminals with the same zeal.
That being said, this is an interesting book. Buntin has researched both men well, and does a good job of re-creating the Los Angeles and the LAPD, circa 1930-1970. He’s obviously spent a great deal of time poring over newspaper accounts, LAPD files, and several biographies and memoirs in recreating the world that Cohen and Parker rose to power in. Those interested in the history of American organized crime will likely be generally familiar with Cohen’s career, but they will still learn some interesting tidbits about him, the LA organized crime scene, and the LAPD. Likewise, Los Angeles history buffs will find this great reading and may see the city in a new light.
I found several insightful things in the book that relate directly to Las Vegas gambling history. When Cohen arrived in Los Angeles as an adult (after a childhood in LA, he had lived in Cleveland and Chicago, among other places), he assumed a place in the city’s organized criminal hierarchy below Ben “Bugsy” Siegel, who’s obviously got some connections to Vegas. Buntin correctly identifies Siegel’s true role in the Flamingo, not as its founder, but as usurper. He also puts Siegel into his proper context, as a criminal entrepreneur with many irons in the fire, some of them (such as the wire service) more lucrative than the Flamingo. Siegel’s murder in Beverly Hills isn’t linked concretely to the Flamingo, as many in Las Vegas would have it, but instead is treated as the unsolved crime that it is. Dozens of people had good reason to see Siegel dead, and most of them had nothing to do with Las Vegas.
Buntin also brings in, for a few moments, two integral Los Angeles figures who transitioned to Las Vegas. Gambling boat operator Tony Cornero and formed LAPD captain and gambling hall owner Guy McAfee. Cornero built the Meadows in Las Vegas in 1931, but is better known for starting work on the Stardust, though he died before it was completed. McAfee owned shares in several Vegas casinos but is most closely associated with the Golden Nugget, over which he presided for many years. Both are interesting figures, and while there probably isn’t enough material to justify a full-scale biography of either, each deserves at least a chapter or two in a prospective book about the connections between LA and LV.
For me, this book was a good read, and if you are interested in Las Vegas history you’ll probably like it for fleshing out the LA crime scene in the years that Vegas was ascendant. The “story” of the book–the struggle between Cohen and Parker–actually takes a back seat to their separate lives.