Being Oscar (2 page)

Every day, no matter what he’s doing or where he’s doing it, Oscar Goodman brings it all to the table. He loves life. There is probably not a better way to describe him.

After his battle with federal authorities in the impeachment of his good friend, the late Judge Harry Claiborne, one of Goodman’s former junior high school teachers wrote a letter to the
Philadelphia Inquirer
, Oscar’s hometown newspaper. The teacher, Joseph L. Pollock, had this to say about Oscar:

“He is a . . . lawyer who combines the scholarship of a Sam Dash, the forensic skills of F. Lee Bailey, and the poise of Melvin Belli. He is in the proud tradition of what is called ‘a Philadelphia lawyer.’ . . . I was Oscar Goodman’s American history and government teacher at the William L. Sayre Junior High School in 1952. In 40 years as a teacher, principal, and superintendent I met few pupils who are his equal in ability, talent, and social consciousness. Philadelphia should be proud of its native son who performed his legal services in a difficult case.”

Oscar Goodman’s roots are in Philadelphia, even if he has come to epitomize Las Vegas. Part of what he brought west is what Philadelphians often refer to as attitude. So while the comment of his former teacher was well-deserved praise, the more telling point was that the praise came not after a great courtroom victory—and God knows Oscar has had many of those—but after a grueling battle that ended in defeat.

Philadelphia can appreciate that. It’s part of the city’s DNA, part of what Sylvester Stallone captured so perfectly in
Rocky
. Life is not about winning, but about going the distance; not about throwing a punch, but taking one; not about getting knocked down, but about getting back up.

Oscar Goodman always gets back up.

—George Anastasia

BEING

OSCAR

T
he crowd was on its feet cheering. Nine thousand fans rising to salute me.

If this was what being mayor was all about, I thought, bring it on. I loved every minute of it. I had only been in office a couple of years and was still feeling my way in the job when I was asked to throw out the first pitch at a game for the Las Vegas 51s, then the triple-A affiliate of the Los Angeles Dodgers. This was our team and this was my city. I couldn’t wait.

My wife Carolyn had driven me to the game at Cashman Field that night. We were running a little late, so she dropped me off before parking the car. Everyone was waiting for me. I emerged in a pinstriped suit, shirt, and tie, the kind of outfit I often wore during my days as a criminal defense attorney. But on this night it fit the image I was to project. They handed me a martini and arranged for Jen and Porsha—two beautiful showgirls wearing four-inch heels and sequined gowns festooned with ten pounds of white feathers—to escort me out to the mound.

While no one knew it at the time, they were witnessing the birth of a brand. On August 17, 2002, I made my first public appearance as the symbol of Las Vegas. I had been a mob lawyer for years and was proud of it. That was my reputation. I also
loved martinis, and on any given night, once I had finished work, I was quite capable of knocking back several.

Martinis, the mayor, and the mob.

How’s that for the city’s image?

On this night, my detractors might have been thinking that, but no one in a position to promote the city, least of all myself, had realized how perfect that image could be. But I’m getting a little ahead of myself.

I walked out to the mound and the overflow crowd—the exact figure was 8,861, about 4,000 more than the normal turnout for a game—rose to cheer me. I nodded in acknowledgment. I couldn’t wave because I had my arms entwined with those of the showgirls. And I didn’t want to spill my martini.

Now I was on the mound and ready to do my stuff. I handed Jen my drink. I slipped out of my suit coat and handed it to Porsha. They both smiled and peeled away. I was alone, center stage, ready to throw out the first pitch.

Did I mention that the first 2,500 fans to arrive that night were given bobblehead dolls of me? The caricature, which I thought looked more like Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., was wearing the same pinstriped suit I had on that night and was holding a baseball bat. It was another first. During my three terms as mayor I would be “bobbleheaded”—is that a word?—about twenty more times.

But as they say, the first is the one you always remember.

I’m on the mound. Ready to pitch. I’ve watched hundreds of baseball games in my lifetime. I played the game. I’m a fan of the game. And, truth be told, I’ve bet on the game. I grew up in Philadelphia where, during my youth, the Phillies were doormats. But that didn’t stop me from embracing the sport. As I was standing on the mound I began channeling the great pitcher Robin Roberts, a star with the Whiz Kids, the only really good
Phillies teams I ever saw growing up. Fastball or curve? What do I want to serve up?

But first I pause and reach for the rosin bag like I’ve seen hundreds of other pitchers do. I load up. The sweat from my hand mixes with the rosin to form a sticky, gooey paste. I take the shiny white baseball and go into my windup. The fans continue to cheer. I rear back and follow through.

Nothing!

The baseball sticks to my hand. No trajectory. The fans grow still. The ball falls from my hand and plunks me on my big left toe. Then it rolls, oh, so slowly, toward first base.

The cheers are now replaced by eight thousand moans. As one voice I hear, “Aggggghhhhhhhhhhhh.”

I think of Charlie Brown when Lucy lifts up the football.

My wife, who was entering the stadium at the time, later talked about the horrible sound. To her it was all audio: first applause and cheering, and then this terrible sound; this group exclamation of disappointment.

What could I do? I bowed, waved, and walked off the mound.

As we all know, there is no crying in baseball. But my wife Carolyn vowed never to go to another game where I threw out the first pitch.

I think it says a lot about me that I was undaunted by the experience. I would be invited twenty-five more times while mayor to throw out the first pitch at a baseball game. The great Greg Maddux, a future member of the Baseball Hall of Fame, even coached me before one game. It was no help. I have thrown out twenty-six pitches. After that first one trickled off my hand, just two of the next twenty-five, all of which made it to the general vicinity of home plate, were strikes.

That’s the beauty of baseball, however. There’s always another chance. Baseball, more than any other sport, teaches us
about life. It teaches us patience and perseverance and something else that is very important; something that we used to learn in kindergarten; something that we seem to have lost sight of in twenty-first century America.

Baseball teaches us that we all have to wait our turn; that we’ll all get a chance, and that the secret to life is to be ready when that chance comes.

My life has been built around chances and opportunities. I’ve taken advantage and succeeded when they presented themselves. In the courtroom and in City Hall, I never backed down, never shied away, never failed to take my cuts.

And I think I can say with certainty that the only time I dropped the ball as mayor of Las Vegas was that night in August, 2002, when I took the mound in Cashman Field.

I had three terms in office, twelve years, and I enjoyed almost every minute of it. Before that I had a career as a criminal defense attorney that spanned more than four decades. I’ve accomplished a lot, but there was more I wished I had done. Anyone who knows me knows I’ve always been a risk-taker, and that I don’t shy away from unpopular positions. For starters, I wish I could have legalized prostitution and drugs . . . all drugs, not just marijuana. More on those issues later in this book.

To me, Las Vegas is unique, unlike any other city in the country—unlike any other city in the world. That’s what I love about the place, and that’s what I’ve always tried to promote.

Sin City? I’ll take it.

Built by the mob? Yeah. So what?

Guys came here with jackets—long criminal arrest records. And when given a second chance, some of them became our founding fathers. Guys like Benny Binion and Moe Dalitz. They
were community leaders. They built churches and synagogues and some of the fanciest gambling palaces the world has ever seen. That distinguished us. Now forty-eight different jurisdictions have some form of gambling. Dozens of places have casinos. But I still consider Atlantic City and those other places the industry equivalent of the 51s—minor leaguers.

Las Vegas, my town, is the major leagues.

O
ver my forty-year career as a defense attorney, I regularly came into contact with people who lied, cheated, and tried to bend the system so that they would come out on top.

Most of them worked for the government.

I’ve never shied away from being called a mob lawyer. That’s what I was. But—and this is important—the men I represented were my clients. They were entitled to a lawyer, the same as any other citizen.

That’s one of the things that always bothered me about the federal government. Strike Force attorneys and FBI agents acted like they were doing God’s work, and therefore they didn’t have to play by the rules. They thought the guys I was representing were evil, and even if there wasn’t enough evidence to prove the charges, it didn’t matter because they were guilty of something. The agents felt that the ends justified the means.

That’s not what the Constitution says, nor is it what the Bill of Rights is about.

My clients were some of the most notorious mobsters in the country, but the guys in the white hats were the ones who I saw breaking the law. In almost every case I tried—and I tried hundreds—Federal prosecutors and FBI agents thought nothing of withholding evidence, distorting the facts, or making deals with despicable individuals who would get up on the witness stand and say whatever they were told.

I was the guy who tried to make the government play by the rules. Sometimes I succeeded. And when I did—and I really mean this—I felt as though I had done something good for the country. I was helping to guarantee the fundamental rights that we’re all entitled to. The grocer, the librarian, the trash collector, and the accountant are all the same under the law. And so is an alleged member or leader of an organized crime family. Just because his name ends in a vowel doesn’t mean some snot-nosed prosecutor with a law degree from Harvard can come along and take away his rights as a citizen.

Maybe that feeling that we’re all equal has more to do with where I came from than where I was when I started practicing law. I grew up in a tough neighborhood in West Philadelphia, a Jewish kid among a lot of Irish Catholics. We’d fight a lot. Sometimes I’d win, most of the time I’d lose, but I wouldn’t back down. Eventually I ended up playing football with a lot of the Catholic guys, and we became friends.

That’s one of those life lessons you learn over time—lessons that you’re not even aware you’re learning. Mine was this: never back down. It’s the way I lived my life as a lawyer, and later as the mayor of Las Vegas.

I had other things going for me, of course. My father, A. Allan Goodman, was a lawyer who worked in the Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office, and my mother was into the arts. I was the oldest of three children, and I received tremendous support from my family. My parents always made me feel I was the handsomest, the smartest, and the best at whatever I did. You can’t underestimate the power of liking who you are if you’re going to make it in the world.