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14 | THE LATEST“Breaking (Into) the Law,” by Camille Cannon.Despite a daunting post-graduate job market, now is the ideal time to give law school a shot—if you’re serious.Plus, our 2014 gift guide, Gramercy gets busy and helping the homeless.

16 | Breaking Stuf & Making Stuf “No Comment,” by Greg Blake Miller. Speed, surveillance and the roots of Internet incivility.

18 | Green Felt Journal “Controlling Interest,” by David G. Schwartz. How the efforts of a few good regulators in the early 1960s kept Nevada’s gaming industry from crapping out.

22 | COVER “In Black (Book) and White,” by Jason Scavone. The legal framework for Nevada’s Excluded Persons List has been repeatedly tested and upheld in the courts. Now one man seeks removal via an untested path: The rules themselves. Plus, a Q&A with Oscar Goodman, a look at landmark legal figures in Nevada history and the trends and big decisions of the year.

29 | NIGHTLIFE“Highly MOTi-vated,” by Kat Boehrer.The Dutch DJ reached out to Tiësto, and now he’s a star.

61 | DININGAl Mancini on Bocho. Plus, the new Off the Strip fulfills brothers’ dreams, Dishing With Grace and Cocktail Culture.

67 | A&E“Baby, Remember His Fame,” by Steve Bornfeld. Long past ’80s stardom, Billy Hufsey plays the fame game in the classroom—and now on a Planet Hollywood stage.Plus, Hertzenberg and Fortenberry team up, The Hit List and Tour Buzz.

72 | Music “Rocking Around the Foil Tree,” by Jason Scavone.Our staff Christmas fanatic mines the mid-mod sonic stylings for his annual list of seasonal songs that don’t suck.

80 | Going for Broke What to do when NFL teams clearly quit on the season? Bet against them!

86 | Seven QuestionsJackie Glass, retired district court judge, on the O.J. Simpson trial, the challenge of celebrity and why the timing of her term on Swift Justice was fortuitous.

DEPARTMENTS

11 | Dialogue

12 | Event

15 | Seven Days

18 | The Deal

34 | Seven Nights

73 | Showstopper

ON THE COVER

Illustration by Ryan Olbrysh

PUBLISHED IN ASSOCIATION WITH THE OBSERVER MEDIA GROUP

Vegas Seven, 888-792-5877, 3070 West Post Road, Las Vegas, NV 89118

Vegas Seven is distributed each Thursday throughout Southern Nevada

c 2014 Vegas Seven, LLC. Reproduction in whole or in part without the permission of Vegas Seven, LLC is prohibited.

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PUBL ISHERMichael Skenandore

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CALENDAR COORDINATOR Camille Cannon

CON T RIBU T ING EDI T ORSMelinda Sheckells (style), Michael Green (politics),

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HIT THE SLOPES

Winter means snow, and snow means skiing. Stay on top of all your winter sports news with Vegas Seven’s monthly ski report. This month, check out what’s new for this season at the little ski resort that could, plus a snowcat adventure in the backcountry at VegasSeven.com/SkiReport.

SHOP TILL YOU DROP

Want to shop local this holiday season? Our first-ever DTLV shopping guide gives you the scoop on the retail outlets that will fill the stockings of loved ones, and perhaps deck your halls. DTLV.com/ShoppingGuide.

GAME ON … AND ON

The PlayStation Experience blew through the Sands Expo Convention Hall on December 6-7 and left a swarm of satisfied gamers in its wake. Watch video-game creatures come to life, players get lost in virtual reality and other highlights at VegasSeven.com/PlayStation.

RETURN TO BATTLE

After aerialist Sarah Guyard-Guillot died last year during the final battle scene of Kà, Cirque du Soleil removed the sequence from the show. Now, equipped with new safety measures, the scene returns December 12. Watch a preview at VegasSeven.com/Ka.

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Imagine Dragons returns to Las Vegas on December 11 to perform at The Joint, but their show is also a homecoming for a little-known local alternative band called Brumby. Ian Caramanzana introduces the bandmates and their new EP at VegasSeven.com/Brumby.

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END HUNGER GAMES BALLThe odds were in favor of fundraising Dec. 6 as

Eglet Law Group turned its annual holiday soiree

into the End Hunger Games Ball at its Downtown

advocacy center. More than 450 guests attended

the benefit for Three Square food bank—includ-

ing Nevada District Court Judges Jerry Wiese and

Nancy Allf, attorney Israel Kunin and state Senator

Tick Segerblom. The Las Vegas Youth Orchestras

serenaded the guests as they sampled a feast from

Wild Truffles Catering. All leftovers were donated

to Veteran’s Village, and an estimated $20,000 was

raised for Three Square.

UPCOMING EVENTS • Dec. 13 All-In for Cerebral Palsy Celebrity Poker Tournament [AllInForCP.com] • Dec. 15 Mondays Dark One-Year Anniversary [HardRockHotel.com]

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IN NOVEMBER 2013, A LAW OFFICE IN Chicago announced that it would offer a $1,000 scholarship “to dissuade students from practicing law.” The Anything But Law School Scholarship was open to students with a minimum 3.0 GPA entering an accredited graduate school, and required a one-page essay detailing why some feld other than law would be interesting and proftable. That’s kind of like your friends who are parents telling you not to have kids because diapers are a bad investment. Kind of.

Certainly, this unique scholarship hits on a major concern for today’s law students: slim pickings in the job market. According to a June report by the National Association for Law Placement, only 84.5 percent of 2013 graduates found employment, and that percentage has been declining since 2007. Large law frms that used to hire in herds scaled back during the Great Recession—and haven’t turned back. And of that 84.5 per-cent that found employment, only 64.4 percent held a position that required passage of the bar exam. In other words, there could potentially be some seriously overqualifed minimum wagers out there making up the difference.

But as the number of job oppor-tunities has dwindled, so has the number of people pursuing a law degree. The American Bar Associa-tion reports an 11 percent decrease in frst-year law school students from fall 2012 to 2013, which is a 24 percent decrease since fall 2010. Somewhat incongruently, the number of law schools has actu-ally increased over time. While the number of law students in 2014 is roughly the same as it was in 1975, there were 163 ABA-approved law schools back in the disco era; now there are 204. In tandem, this trend of fewer applicants and more schools is advantageous to prospec-

tive students.In a June article titled “Apply to

Law School Now! Yes, We’re Seri-ous,” Slate’s senior business and economics correspondent Jordan Weissmann predicted that the number of graduates fnding long-term, full-time work in the legal feld will hit 91 percent for the class of 2016. (“The only reason,” he says, “is that enough students gave up on the idea of becoming lawyers amid

a market that was fooded with job-less young people.”) Daniel Hamil-ton, the dean of UNLV’s Boyd School of Law, concurs with Weissmann’s assessment. “This is the best time to apply and go to law school in a gen-eration,” he says. “The competition is ferce, and the ability to negotiate tuition is widespread.”

Negotiate tuition? Yep. Nowadays, applicants can—and should—leverage multiple offers to get the best deal,

Hamilton says. “A student applies to law school at UNLV or anywhere else, and calls you up and says, ‘I’ve got this offer at school A and this offer at school B. Let’s talk.’” Indeed, this is what The New York Times describes as a buyers’ market for law students. Popular legal-specifc websites such as LawSchoolNumbers.com and Top-Law-Schools.com permit applicants to post and share personal stats and scholarship offers, meaning the fnancial factors of the equation are more transparent than ever.

This doesn’t mean a J.D. comes cheap, of course. According to the ABA, the average amount bor-rowed by law students in the 2012-13 academic year was $32,289 at public schools and $44,094 at private institutions. Multiply that by three years and … yeah, that adds up to a crapload of diapers.

But all of these factors work in favor of the legal industry in this regard: Anyone pursuing a law degree today is likely in it for the right reasons, which is to say they’re wholeheartedly devoted to pursu-ing a legal career. “I think it’s fair to say that in decades prior you could apply to law school as a kind of holding pattern,” Hamilton says. “[These changes] in legal education have done away with law school as a default option.”

Still, whether you’re newly enrolled or Elle Woods, there’s no denying that a law degree is a huge fnancial and emotional undertak-ing. Shane Jackson, a frst-semester student at Boyd, estimates spend-ing anywhere from 20 to 40 hours a week on his studies. So while optimistic about fnding a job when he graduates (expected: 2017), he’s realistic about the journey to that destination. “If you don’t have a masochistic urge to bury yourself in diffcult texts,” Jackson says, “law school probably isn’t for you.”

Fair enough.

News, gaming, deals and spare thoughts on our passion for bowling

“They may operate under the cover of false names,

but their actions are lit by the glow of a million

screens.” BREAKING STUFF & MAKING STUFF {PAGE 16}

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Breaking (Into) the LawDespite a daunting post-graduate job market, now is the ideal time to give law school a shot—if you’re serious

By Camille Cannon

PROJECTOR SCREENS, WINE, CHEESE AND TREADMILLS are just a few things on Jay Krigsman’s mind these days. The executive vice president for Krausz Companies, which is a joint owner of the Gramercy in the southwest part of the Valley, is in the midst of a lease and letter-of-intent maelstrom. But it should all pay off in the spring with plenty of live-work-players at the new community, which is being billed as an “urban village.”

To date, Krausz has leased about two-thirds of the 200,000 square feet of offce space at the former Manhattan West recessionary casualty. The three main tenants are custom homebuilder Touchstone Living, Regus offce suites and HDI (Health Data Insights), a medical and fnancial services com-pany. HDI currently has some employees on-site, and hiring is under way. Regus and Touchstone are building out their spaces.

The Gramercy is intended to be a chain-free din-ing destination with hip concepts, such as DW Bis-tro’s market and kitchen, which is under construc-tion. So is Cuppa Coffee House and Alex Stratta’s Italian Steakhouse. All should open in the spring.

Krigsman says a ftness operator must also gel with the Starbucks- and Subway-free dining offer-ings. “We don’t want them only using four walls.

… You see it all the time at apartment complexes: a couple of treadmills, an elliptical [machine] and a plasma screen,” he says. “We want to see exercise groups, yoga, stretching in the central park area. This place should always have energy.”

That central park area is positioned between the Gramercy’s two residential buildings and will be home to a pool, fre pits and the largest outdoor projection screen in the Valley.

Krigsman says the frst residents should be mov-ing into the New York-style apartments by January, with monthly rents ranging from the $900s for studios to more than $4,000 for penthouses. And it appears that demand is outpacing supply by about a 5-to-1 ratio, with more than 1,000 names inquir-ing about the 245 units.

“I’m hoping by late spring we’ll have evenings in the plaza, movies under the stars, farmers mar-kets,” Krigsman says. “By next summer, we should be humming.”

By Bob Whitby

THURSDAY, DEC. 11: Henderson is cranking

up the holiday machine this week-

end with the WinterFest celebra-

tion, three days of making merry

down on Water Street. Things

get rolling tonight with the Hen-

derson Symphony Orchestra’s

Sounds of the Season concert,

and continue through Saturday

with carriage rides, a festival of

trees, arts and crafts, a parade, etc.

HendersonLive.com.

FRIDAY, DEC. 12: Don’t know about you, but we think

the holidays could use a few new traditions. Here’s

one: A Very Merry Unauthorized Children’s Sci-

entology Pageant! It’s kind of a mash-up of actual

Scientology teachings and a nativity scene, if you

can grasp that. 8 p.m. at Art Square Theatre, with

shows through Dec. 20. Table8LV.com.

SATURDAY, DEC. 13: Every year about this time we

strongly suggest that you catch a ride on Boulder City’s

Santa Train. It’s the Nevada State Railroad Museum’s

holiday run in a real train, and it allows you to hang

with Santa and Mrs. Claus. Warning: The Santa Train is

only this weekend and next, and it always sells out. Buy

tickets in advance at NevadaSouthern.com.

SUNDAY, DEC. 14: While we’re on the topic

of don’t-miss annual events, it’s

time once again for the Nevada

Ballet Theatre’s production of

The Nutcracker at The Smith

Center. It features a full or-

chestra, lush intricate sets and

some beautiful dancing. 7:30

p.m., with shows through Dec. 21.

TheSmithCenter.com.

MONDAY, DEC. 15: Remember when the

UNLV Solar Decathlon Team pretty much

cleaned up at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Solar

Decathlon competition last year? Their project, a

754-square-foot self-sustaining desert home, is now

on display at Springs Preserve. Yes, you really can

live comfortably without 3,500 square feet. Open

daily. SpringsPreserve.org for info.

TUESDAY, DEC. 16: Winter officially arrives in five days,

but there’s no reason you shouldn’t go ice skating

right now. That’s possible at several places during our

relatively warm cold period, including at Downtown

Summerlin’s Rock Rink. Open daily through mid-

January, the rink blends skating with light shows and

a DJ on weekends. DowntownSummerlin.com.

WEDNESDAY, DEC. 17: What makes one building

a place people want to be and another

a place people want to avoid? What

goes into designing the physical

spaces that surround us? These

and other questions are explored

in Reflecting and Project-

ing: Twenty Years of Design

Excellence, a new exhibit of

award-winning design projects at

UNLV’s Marjorie Barrick Museum.

Through Feb. 28. UNLV.edu.GR

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While we’re on the topic

Remember when the

Henderson is cranking

up the holiday machine this week-

trees, arts and crafts, a parade, etc.

a place people want to be and another

a place people want to avoid? What

Finishing TouchesLong-awaited Gramercy

fnally nearing completion

By Brian Sodoma

HELPING HANDSSouthern Nevada has the fastest-

growing homeless population in the

nation—a population that’s increased

28 percent since 2013, according to

the Clark County Department of Social

Service. What’s more, WalletHub

recently named Nevada as the least

charitable state in the U.S. But

some locals are out there helping to

disprove the latter assertion, if not

improve the former statistic.

Gene Gunnels, a musician and

owner of the Hot Diggity Dog stand,

does his part every December. The

effort began about six years ago,

when friends and colleagues pitched

in to help Gunnels get his business

off the ground. “When the holidays

came around, I thought I would like to

give back to the community,” he says.

Naturally, he chose to serve hot dogs

to the hungry and homeless, offering

a variety of options. “It lets [them] feel

like their choices are important to us,

and that makes them smile,” he says.

Several food trucks have since

joined in, volunteering time, food

and facilities; others donate food,

blankets and other necessities. “We

know we cannot change the home-

less situation by doing this,” Gunnells

says. “But we do want to put a smile

on a few faces for at least a day.”

Jordan Cohen, a drummer with

Blue Man Group, has been organizing

a drive for the Las Vegas Rescue

Mission for almost a decade. Along

with fellow Blue Man cast and crew,

Cohen gathers food, toiletries, clothing,

household items and toys. “I wanted to

do something for the community, and I

saw the homeless problem growing,”

he says. “When you do charitable

things, you can’t get away from the fact

that you feel good about yourself, but

then you get over it and do the work.”

Merideth Spriggs has a personal

interest in helping the homeless:

When the recession hit in 2008, she

briefly joined their ranks. “I saw how

it could happen to anybody: I was

homeless with a master’s degree.”

Now she works with the Downtown

Rangers on their homeless outreach

program, connecting the less

fortunate with shelter and other

services. She’s also begun working

on a partnership with the Las Vegas

Metropolitan Police Department

called the Giving Project. “It’s a safe

space where the homeless can come

and people can give,” she says. The

next Giving Project is from 9:30 a.m.-

noon December 13 at the American

Legion-Las Vegas Post 8, 733 N.

Veterans Memorial Drive.

– Lissa Townsend Rodgers

Want to help? Contact Gene@

HotdiggitydogLV.com for the Dec. 14

food-truck event; Las Vegas Rescue

Mission at VegasRescue.org; and the

Giving Project at TheGivingProject@

Hotmail.com.

The scene at Hot Diggity Dog’s feed-the-hungry event.

IN THE PAST YEAR, MANY ONLINE publications have told would-be commenters that they would need to take their conversa-tions elsewhere. One of the frst, Popular Science, decided that comment threads, often rife with misinformation, detracted from the articles that preceded them. More recently, the technology site Re/code dropped its commenting function, declaring that social me-dia was a more appropriate space for discussion. And this fall the English-language Moscow Times—one of the last sources of non-Putinized information in Russia—had to shut down what we might call The After-Party of the Trolls, a comment-thread cage match that would have a left tag team of Rush Limbaugh and Lenny Bruce bloodied and weeping.

Readers of online media can be forgiven for snorting at the notion that the original, con-versation-starting article is the product of hard work and refec-tion. This is a medium, after all, that brings you thrice-regurgi-tated stories under fresh bylines, illustrated lists of celebrities with cellulite and political meme photos with fabricated quotes.

But let’s assume for a moment that a world survives in which writers are appropriately trained and paid: It’s reasonable enough to hope that unexamined con-spiracy theories and gleeful hate speech should not attain equiva-lency with well-informed and thoughtfully rendered articles. Even if a reader disagrees with the article, the comment thread below the big Neil Armstrong feature probably isn’t the place for musings on how 8-year-old Barack Obama singlehandedly faked the moon landing.

The renowned foreign corre-spondent Anne Applebaum re-cently issued an elegant warning in Slate about the power of paid trolls who can profoundly shift online discussion. She concluded that the real problem was not the payment, but the empowerment that comes with anonymity. It’s a powerful argument: University of Houston researcher Arthur Santana has found that more than 50 percent of anonymous posts include “vulgar, racist, pro-fane or hateful” language.

But what if we go one step fur-ther in our dissection of Internet incivility? What if the producers of content and comment alike

suffer from the same disorder: speed addiction? What if the problem of anonymity begins with surveillance? What if the virus of harsh judgment begins with the fear of being judged? In other words, what if the gal-loping falsehoods and rampant discourteousness of what is po-tentially the greatest storytelling medium ever conceived are the result of our basic assumptions about the Web? If we view the Web as a place for quick words, loosely held secrets, vast reach and swift judgment, should we be surprised that we’ve created an engine for fear and aggression?

Thoughtful communication begins with a measured study of our surroundings, private refec-tion upon what we’ve learned and rigorous questioning of our own assumptions. It’s pretty antiquated stuff, but then so is the old saw about looking both ways before you cross the street. To productively take part in the big conversation, we need not

only to live our lives, execut-ing a series of actions in time, but to process those lives, taking the time to think and dream about what it all means. It makes sense to withhold the music of public communication until the score is written. We nurse, nur-ture, study and work upon our thoughts so that at the point of communication these thoughts are fully rendered into the cur-rency of civil discourse.

The perceived need for speed, the nagging anxiety (or exhi-bitionist glee) that one is being watched, and the sense that one must judge or be judged has created a Hobbesian struggle online. Some of us choose to opt out; some choose to wear a mask of chirpy positivity, hop-ing that fulsome praise will provide shelter from the storm. Others, however, decide that the best defense is a good of-fense. They may operate under the cover of false names, but their actions are lit by the glow of a million screens. All at once they experience the opiate power of being both known and unknown. They move swiftly, and without mercy.

Greg Blake Miller, Ph.D., is the director of Olympian Creative Education. OlympianCreative.com.16

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Seems like the entire world is doing business on Twitter these days, so I recently turned to the social media titan to solicit questions. Here are two I received:

@KANDITAM2001 ASKS:

IS BOWLING REALLY THAT

POPULAR IN LAS VEGAS?

It certainly seems that way. As is the case in the rest of the country, most freestanding Southern Nevada bowling centers have disappeared (RIP West Hill Lanes; long live Boulder Bowl!). But at least ours were replaced by lanes in many of our so-called “locals casinos.” (Of note: the original Arizona Charlie’s was built to incorporate the existing Charleston Heights bowling alley. Charlie’s eventually closed the lanes in 1992.) And thanks to the casino subsidy, not only is bowling in Las Vegas cheaper than in most other cities, it’s also (ironically) shed its shady stigma to emerge as family-friendly fun in a city starved for it. Gone are the smoky lanes and scantily clad cocktail waitresses; now it’s cosmic bowling and “Kids bowl free!”

Add to that the fact that Vegas is a competi-tive city whose future rests on beating other cities at their own game (see the aggressive way in which we retained the National Finals Rodeo last year after it considered riding off to Orlando). Hence the new $35 million, 60-lane South Point Bowling Plaza. Separate from the casino’s public lanes, the center is set up spe-cifically for pro competition, with 360 specta-tor stadium seats and two 167-foot digital dis-plays. Combined with Reno’s National Bowling Stadium, South Point’s facility will help make Nevada the country’s bowling capital. You’d better get practicing on picking up your splits.

@MRBLUELOUBOYLE ASKS:

WHAT IS THE BEST SPORTS BAR

OFF THE STRIP?

Depends on what you want, though I think we all want cheap booze, decent food and great TVs. There are plenty of joints that turn extra special for fans on game days because of their affiliation with specific teams. That explains why, for instance, Green Bay Packers fans flock to Big Dog’s Draft House, a home away from home for Wisconsin folk. And why my favorite is Born and Raised, perhaps the city’s only UNLV-specific sports bar. A close second for me is the Crown & Anchor British pub near the university; at least there I don’t get mocked for liking soccer.

Want to bet the farm without fighting Strip crowds? Download one of the popular mobile betting apps from a place like William Hill or Station Casinos and fund your account. Then, hit up your favorite bar, where you can eat, drink, socialize, play video poker and place sports bets—all without ever leaving your own neighborhood. Talk about vice convenience!

Questions? AskaNative@VegasSeven.com.

J A M E S P . R E Z A

Breaking Stuff & Making Stuff

Mad musings on the creative life

G R E G B L A K E

M I L L E R

No CommentSpeed, surveillance and the roots of Internet incivility

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GRANT SAWYER DESERVES MUCH OF THEcredit for Nevada taking its current shape. In his frst year as governor in 1959, Sawyer created the Nevada Gaming Commission, taking the responsibility for issuing licenses and directing policy away from the state’s Tax Commission. According to Sawyer’s then-executive as-sistant Bob Faiss, who would go on to shape gaming law in the 1970s, Sawyer had a simple directive for the new body: “If there are any members of the underworld in the gaming industry, get them out. If they are not here, keep them out. I want you to hang tough!”

Sawyer’s “hang tough” policy emerged at a crucial time: Bobby Kennedy’s Justice Department would ratchet up pressure on Nevada casinos starting in 1961, and without the good-faith efforts of Sawyer’s appointees to clean house, more sweeping federal ac-tion seemed inevitable.

While the Gaming Commission was a key part of the equation, the Gaming Control Board—created in 1955—was actually empowered to investigate and police the industry and its applicants. That body—which included three members appointed by the governor, as well as administrative, accounting and enforcement staff—would in large part decide just how tough to hang.

Ed Olsen, chairman of the Gam-ing Control Board from 1961 to 1966, was an unlikely choice for such a prominent role at such a perilous time. Born in New York in 1919, he worked as a journal-ist in California, Nevada, Idaho and Oregon before Sawyer asked him to serve as an intermediary between the Board and the Gam-

ing Commission. An intermediary was needed because things were not as peaceable at the time as one might imagine; apparently there was some tension between Milton Keefer and James Hotchkiss, two members of the Commission (Keefer was chairman), and Ray Abbaticchio, Sawyer’s pick for Board chairman; all three were former FBI agents. Olsen managed to smooth things over between the regulators, but ultimately Ab-baticchio’s unpopularity led to his removal. Needing a replacement, Sawyer turned to Olsen, who was as surprised as anyone to get the call from the governor.

Olsen certainly had no problem adhering to Sawyer’s “hang tough” directive: He stared down Frank Sinatra over the singer’s decision to host Sam Giancana at the Cal-Neva. Sinatra blinked. But he also knew when to keep an open mind. Teamsters Union head Jimmy Hoffa was, at the time, locked in a death struggle with Attorney General Kennedy. Should the Board recommend that the union’s pension fund be prohibited from investing in Nevada casinos? Olsen and the board took a calculated risk by allowing Teamster loans, a risk that gave casinos an infusion of capital at a critical juncture.

Olsen also was instrumental in seeing that Nevada’s gaming indus-

try kept true to its pledge (and legal obligation) to desegregate. Olsen deputized an African-American man as an undercover agent, and made it known that denying any-one access to casino facilities would not be tolerated. That wasn’t a uni-versally popular action in 1961, but one Olsen saw as vital to ensuring the integrity of the industry.

Richard Schuetz, a gaming industry veteran and current member of the California Gam-bling Control Commission who interviewed Olsen in the former regulator’s fnal days, was struck by Olsen’s ethics and personal strength. “His greatest signif-cance,” Schuetz says, “was that he realized the threat to the industry imposed by the federal govern-ment and ensured that these threats did not [destroy] the indus-try. When one looks at the lineup of people who were antagonistic toward Nevada gambling, includ-ing Senators [John] McClellan and [Estes] Kefauver, [FBI Director] J. Edgar Hoover, Robert Kennedy and a national press led by the Chi-cago Sun-Times, it really is amazing that Nevada gaming survived.”

With another man at the helm of the Gaming Control Board, it’s possible that the 1960s would have ended with Nevada gaming in shambles, instead of being on the cusp of the corporate era. As to-day’s Board and Commission face new challenges, it’s important to realize that much of their regula-tion is not about blindly enforc-ing statutes, but making tough—though necessary—decisions.

David G. Schwartz is the director of UNLV’s Center for Gaming Research.

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TIME TO CASH IN ON HOLIDAY OFFERINGSHoliday deals dominate December, and it starts

with ice skating. The Venetian ditched its rink

this year, but you can still get your skate on

at the Cosmopolitan and Caesars Palace, as

well as at Downtown Summerlin, through

early January. The Caesars rink opens earliest

every day (11 a.m.), but it’s $20 for a 90-minute

session, as opposed to $10 for locals at the

Cosmopolitan and $15 at Summerlin for all-day

access. The Summerlin fee includes skate

rental, which is $5 more at the other places.

Do some shopping before or after skating, and

you can parlay that into a buffet two-fer. Through

December 24, show a same-day receipt of at

least $20 from a Downtown Summerlin store to

get a 2-for-1 buffet at nearby Red Rock Resort.

While the Venetian is rink-less, it is offering

locals what amounts to a 2-for-1 deal for the

holiday version of the show Human Nature.

Buy a $79 or $99 ticket for a December

12-16 performance and get a second ticket

for $1 when you use the code “BOGO1.” The

Venetian also has a locals-only deal for two

tickets to Rock of Ages for $99 when you use

the code “99 LOCAL.”

Another locals-only offer gets you 50 per-

cent off dining at the Commissary and S+O at

Downtown Grand. Just show ID. And Silverton

is offering 2-for-1 buffets or 50 percent off

for single diners on Wednesdays in December

(excludes Dec. 24). Print out the necessary

coupon at a casino kiosk.

With the rodeo still in town, plenty of

drinking specials are out there, but I’m partial

to that great holiday tradition from Ellis Island:

homemade alcohol-infused eggnog. This one

packs a punch and is available from the bar for

$6 by the glass or $30 for a bottle.

If you haven’t been playing Boyd casinos’

Pick the Pros free football contest, this is a

good time to start. For the final four weeks of

the season, the weekly prize pool has been

upped from $30,000 to $50,000. Just swipe

your B Connected card at a kiosk in the Orleans,

Gold Coast, Suncoast, Sam’s Town, California or

Fremont to play. You must submit picks before

kickoff of the first Sunday games. Granted,

99.99 percent of you won’t cash, but the .01

percent who do are gonna be real happy!

If you’re contemplating securing a “safe-

room” for New Year’s Eve, there were 77

hotel-casinos with NYE availability when our

Las Vegas Advisor researchers called around

last week. The best price in the entire Valley

was at the Lucky Club for $130. Downtown, it

was the Plaza at $189; on the Strip, it was the

Riviera at $289. I also like the two-night pack-

ages at South Point for $220, and Downtown

Grand or Four Queens for $338 each. Hurry,

these go fast!

Anthony Curtis is the publisher of the

Las Vegas Advisor and LasVegasAdvisor.com.

Controlling InterestHow the eforts of a few good regulators in the early 1960s

kept Nevada’s gaming industry from crapping out

Nevada Governor Grant Sawyer and gaming adversaries U.S. Senator Estes Kefauver and U.S. Attorney

General Robert Kennedy.

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STYLE

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ELECTRONICS

Samsung Galaxy Note 4, $299 (depending on carrier), and Gear Fit, $150; Samsung.com.

1 GoPro Hero 4, $399 (silver), $499 (black) with Fetch (dog harness), $60, in REI at the District at Green Valley Ranch, 702-896-7111; REI.com.

Destiny PlayStation 4 Bundle in glacier white, $399, Target, various locations; Target.com.

WD My Cloud 2TB, $149, Fry’s Electronics in Town Square, 702-932-1400; Frys.com.

PowerBeats2 Wireless In-Ear Headphones, $200, Apple Store, various locations; Apple.com.

FOR HIM

2 Nixon the Diplomatic, $1,200, in Tourneau at the Forum Shops, 702-732-8463; Tourneau.com.

Brixton Hooligan Cap in Washed Black, $34, in Nordstrom at Fashion Show, 702-862-2525; Nordstrom.com.

AllSaints Conroy Leather Biker jacket, $650, in AllSaints at the Forum Shops at Caesars, 702-920-0745; US.AllSaints.com.

Norelco 9100 Series laser-guided beard trimmer, $90; Amazon.com.

Herschel Supply Campaign Luggage (carry-on size), $190; Zappos.com.

FOR HER

Dior New Couture by Patrick Demarchelier, $115; RizzoliUSA.com.

Neiman Marcus PopSugar Must-Have gift box, $250; Musthave.PopSugar.com; NeimanMarcus.com.

Adidas Originals by Rita Ora sweatshirt dress, $85; Adidas.com.

Luxe by Lisa Vogel Essentials, $53-$95; Swimspot.com.

3 LeSportsac x Tokidoki Rondine Weekender, $278; in LeSportsac at Fashion Show, 702-731-0988; LeSportsac.com.

PERSONALIZED

ONLINE SHOPPING

Five Four Club (private label for men), $60 for $120 worth of clothes; FiveFourClothing.com.

4 Trunk Club (designer labels for men), a personal stylist handpicks a trunk of clothes and ships it to you for free; TrunkClub.com.

Bungalow Clothing (designer labels for women), a style concierge builds a dressing room and you try before you buy; BungalowClothing.com.

Glossy Box (five luxury beauty products), monthly plans start at $21;GlossyBox.com.

Birchbox, monthly delivery of personalized beauty or grooming samples, $30-$60; Birchbox.com.

BEAUTY

5 Kiehl’s Creme de Corps Norman Rockwell Limited Edition, $18, in Kiehl’s at the Forum Shops at Caesars, 702-784-0025; Kiehls.com.

Beauty Kitchen Jet-Setting Travel Kit, $30; HeatherMarianna.TV/Shop.

Pout by Amy customizable lip gloss, $20; to purchase, email amybeth317@gmail.com.

Amope Pedi Perfect Electronic Foot File, $40-$50, Walgreens, various locations; Walgreens.com.

The Selfie Brush By J&D, $17, Sally Beauty Supply, various locations.

HOME

Keurig 2.0 Brewing System, $200; Keurig.com.

T-Fal OptiGrill, $180; Macy’s, various locations; Macys.com.

Baz Dazzled Holiday Gold Fur-Trim Crown Topper, $68, in Barneys at the Grand Canal Shoppes at the Venetian/Palazzo, 702-629-4200; Barneys.com.

Sur La Table Cooking Classes, starting at $39, Sur La Table in Downtown Summerlin; 702-448-8611; SurLaTable.com.

6 Prisma Gold Frame, $13, in the Paper Source at Town Square, 702-262-1379; PaperSource.com.

WRAP IT UPStill searching for that perfect gif?

Here are 30 ideas for him,

her and home.

Compiled by Melinda Sheckells

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The legal framework for Nevada’s Excluded Persons List has been repeatedly tested and upheld in the courts. Now one man seeks removal via an untested path: the rules themselves.

T H E L E G A L I S S U E

Now one man seeks removal via an untested path: the rules themselves.

louis tom dragna died in November 2012 at 92. Not bad

by any standard, but as far as wise guys go, it’s positively Methuselean.

Dragna was the son of Tom, consigliere to Jack Dragna, who headed the Los An-geles mob until his death in 1956. Louis might have been the acting boss of the L.A. family; he might have turned the gig down. Details are a he-said, she-said be-tween mob rats, the feds and purported insiders. Either way, he was one of the 11 men originally placed on the Nevada Gaming Control Board’s Excluded Per-sons List—a.k.a. the Black Book—in 1960.

It took Louis Tom Dragna until May 2014 before his name was removed, proving the Black Book is like the old Othello slogan: A minute to join, a life-time to get off.

While the reality of the Black Book is well known, the legal processes around it are still somewhat arcane and disturb-ingly vague. It starts with two interlock-ing regulations—Nevada Revised Stat-utes sections 463.151 through 463.155, and the Regulations of the Nevada Gaming Commission and State Gam-ing Control Board section 28. These two moderately verbose hunks of legalese give the state the authority and means to ban people from casinos. Technically, there are four criteria outlined that get you the scarlet letter treatment:

• Prior conviction of a crime which

is a felony in this state or under the laws of the United States, a crime in-volving moral turpitude, or a viola-tion of the gaming laws of any state;

• Violation or conspiracy to violate the

provisions of this chapter relating to: The failure to disclose an interest in a gaming establishment for which the person must obtain a license; or willful evasion of fees or taxes;

• Notorious or unsavory reputation

which would adversely affect public confdence and trust that the gam-ing industry is free from criminal or corruptive elements; or

• Written order of a governmental

agency which authorizes the exclu-sion or ejection of the person from an establishment at which gaming or pari-mutuel wagering is conducted.

What started in 1960 with a bunch of mobsters and associates has become over the years a repository largely for slot and card cheats who had the bad luck to draw the Gaming Control Board’s attention. It’s more historical oddity than crucial bit of public service at this point; a ward against ghosts. It’s been 10 years since anyone accused of organized crime ties made the cut. But the above language gives broad power to state authorities in deciding who to sacrifce on the regulatory altar.

In practice, what happens is the Gam-ing Control Board accepts nominations from law-enforcement agencies or, in rare cases, from casinos themselves. Since the 1970s, anyone nominated to the Black Book can get a hearing. If the Board votes to accept the nomination of an individual, the wheels go in motion. The Gaming Commission becomes the arbiter of evidence and decides the

nominee’s fate. If it isn’t a foregone conclusion, it’s close. No one the Board has sent to a hearing has escaped the Black Book—unless they died or went to jail prior to the Commission’s decision. (James Tamer had the rare honor of a second-ballot call. He was nominated twice, dismissed the frst time in 1986 and entered the second in 1988.)

So how does law enforcement de-cide whom to target in the frst place? Why are some enemies of the industry while others, like John Kane and Andre Nestor—who were recently the subject of an extensive Wired magazine piece about exploiting a bug in video-poker software to the tune of hundreds of thousands of dollars—are still allowed in Nevada casinos without the threat of a gross misdemeanor?

“I don’t know. I imagine it’s because they reach a certain level of frequency or seriousness of the crime,” says Gam-ing Commissioner Joe W. Brown, who is the director of the frm Fennemore

Craig Jones Vargas. “They are actively

pursuing their trade of cheating at cards or whatever they’re doing that they are deemed unft to be in a casino. I guess it’s probably habitual.”

Frank Citro Jr. was convicted in 1985 on one count of racketeering. He was caught up with six others accused of running a loan-sharking operation that targeted poker players at the Califor-nia Bell Club. The government said the group all had ties to a Chicago crime family and were trying to set up a large-scale loan-sharking and bookmaking op-eration from Southern California to Las Vegas. Three of seven who were accused

walked, but Citro was sentenced to two years in prison and fve years’ probation. He got out in 1990. That’s when a certi-fed letter arrived, telling him he would have to appear before the Commission.

Most people fngered by the Board don’t show for their hearing. Citro did.

On the frst day, he wore a tux. The Commission, apparently, didn’t see the humor. When the hearing reconvened on November 21, 1991, Deputy Attor-ney General Lisa Miller presented, on behalf of the Board, the bill of particu-lars for Citro’s inclusion. (It’s always the deputy AG for gaming who presents the Board’s case.) She leaned on four felony convictions—particularly the last one that supposedly proved Citro’s associa-tion with organized crime fgures—as the meat of her argument.

Citro’s attorney, William Watters, was ill-prepared. He disputed one of the felony convictions, but couldn’t pro-duce supporting documents. His ar-gument against “unsavory reputation” was even less convincing. “We’re here to tell you that the reputation has been manufactured by the government, giv-ing him a moniker. You can’t be a gang-ster without a moniker. … [It] was given to him. He didn’t earn it.” Inherit the Wind, this was not.

The convictions are what they are, but “unsavory reputation” is shark-skin slippery. It gives the Commission enormous leeway when they’re mak-ing their decision. And that decision, Brown says, comes if the Commission is swayed by a preponderance of the evidence—not nearly the beyond-a-reasonable-doubt of a criminal-court case. Even hearsay is allowed.

“It’s the best judgment or discretion of the Board,” Brown says. “Perhaps maybe a thing you might argue about is an unsavory reputation. I guess that may be in the eye of the beholder. For the most part, things I’m aware of are if a guy is arrested and convicted of cheating or [committing] some crime against the casinos, or obviously some blatant crime of murder.”

That’s, of course, if they come under formal review in the frst place. None of the co-defendants in Citro’s rack-eteering case ever faced down a hear-ing. Commissioner Kenneth Gragson even asked about Joseph Bolognese, a Las Vegan acquitted in Citro’s trial.

Miller demurred because of the acquit-tal, even though Bolognese’s reputa-tion was, in theory, just as unsavory as Citro’s. Hell, at the James Tamer hear-ing, the Board tried to contend that his association with Moe Dalitz was proof of his unsavory reputation. Yes, the Desert Inn’s Moe Dalitz.

Citro brought his family to the hear-ing and testifed on his own behalf. No dice. It took less than two hours for the Commission to vote him in. And for 22 years, that’s where it stood. Then, in 2013, Citro did something unexpect-ed: He went public with his intent to mount a challenge to be removed un-der a provision—section 28.080—titled “Petition to remove from the list.” It states: “Any person who, after a fnal determination by the Commission, has been placed upon the list may petition the Commission in writing and request that his name be removed from such list. The petition shall be verifed and state with specifcity the grounds be-lieved by the petitioner to constitute good cause for removal of his name.”

Citro believes he has “good cause,” and hired Arlington, Virginia-based at-

“I THINK THE BLACK BOOK IS THE MOST UNCONSTITUTIONAL INVENTION THAT HAS EVER

HIT THE FACE OF THE EARTH.” – Oscar Goodman

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torney Michael Lasher to handle his case. “The large argument is that Frankie for 26 years has not reoffended. He has done charitable works. The inability to get into the casinos hampers his ability to raise more money for the charities and frankly support himself,” Lasher says. “If we were just trying to expunge any collateral con-sequence of a conviction, he’d be able to do it. For this statute to have any meaning or validity, [the Gaming Commission] has to entertain these things.”

Citro isn’t the frst to shoot for removal. Two men, Ruby Kolod and “Icepick” Willie Alderman, did the nigh-impossible and got themselves off the Book in 1965, probably with the substantial aid of Dalitz.

John Marshall, another of the original 11, challenged the law itself on constitutional grounds, but the 9th Circuit shut down that avenue in Marshall v. Sawyer, saying due-process rights didn’t apply. Marshall tried to take his case to the U.S. Supreme Court, but was denied a hearing in 1967. Tony Spilotro took a similar shot with the help of Oscar Goodman, this time in the Nevada Supreme Court, but the high court in 1983 was as unsympathetic as its federal counterpart 16 years earlier.

Lasher says that if Citro’s petition fails—and the Commission could simply elect not to hear it—he could consider attacking the statute under the 14th Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause, arguing that because a felon could expunge it proves the excluded are being treated unfairly. There’s one problem with that theory: Marshall and Spilotro both failed specif-cally with 14th Amendment arguments.

“I think the Black Book is the most un-constitutional invention that has ever hit the face of the Earth,” Goodman says. “People are branded with the mark of Cain. ... It would be different if it would be a gambling-related offense, but to tell somebody who has been convicted of insurance fraud he can’t go into a casino restroom makes no sense. It was just a way of showing some muscle.”

In their 1995 book The Black Book and the Mob: The Untold Story of the Control of Ne-vada’s Casinos, UNLV criminal justice pro-fessors Ronald Farrell and Carole Case got to the end of the same rainbow. “So the Black Book indeed has served a purpose, though it’s largely a symbolic one. It has helped convey a public image of gaming as a legitimate industry and of the state as ca-pable of keeping it free of crime and cor-rupting infuences. Neither the possibility that the stated threats are not the real ones nor the continued existence of numerous other threats to gaming is as important as the belief that all is well in Babylon.”

At the moment, though, it’s moot. Citro says a recent surgery has caused him to sideline his pursuit. Lasher says he’s wait-ing on supporting evidence from his cli-ent before he can fle. Once he gets it, he can have the petition fled within hours.

“I’m not gonna lay down, baby,” Citro, now 69, says. “I’m not a punk. I’m not the toughest guy in the world, but I ain’t gon-na lay down. If these guys don’t put me back in that casino, I’m gonna come back and haunt them. The only way to dispute it is for me to do what I’ve done all these years: Be a good guy.”

Las Vegas resident Frank Citro Jr. has been banned from

Nevada casinos since being placed in the Black Book in 1991.

T H E L E G A L I S S U E

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➜ The sound of the judge’s gavel banging against the block always carries beyond the courtroom, because so many judicial deci-sions directly impact our lives. That’s been particularly true in Nevada this year, as a slew of legal developments have made headlines—some big, some small, all significant.

The year’s most talked-about legal decision came down October 6, when the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear petitions regard-ing the ban on same-sex marriage, thereby upholding the appellate court’s decision to strike down the ban. The Supreme Court’s decision marked the tipping point for mar-riage equality and eventually led to more than half the country legal-izing same-sex marriage.

One day after the Supreme Court had its say, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals struck down Nevada and Idaho’s same-sex marriage bans. While it would take two days to clear legal hurdles, Nevada issued its first same-sex marriage license October 9. Now, gay couples no longer have to worry about if they can get mar-ried, only whether it will be in a chapel or a drive-through, and whether they’ll use a traditional officiant or Elvis.

The Nevada Supreme Court made a major ruling this fall that will have lasting effects on banks. In SFR Investments Pool 1 v. U.S. Bank, the court left some banks feeling robbed by ruling that a homeowners association’s prior-ity lien may wipe out a bank’s first deed of trust. The case revolved around real estate investors who purchased a Southern Highlands home for $6,000 from an HOA fore-closure sale, which extinguished U.S. Bank’s first deed of trust.

That same day, the Nevada Supreme Court de-pantsed the strip-club industry, upholding a ruling that club operators must pay Nevada’s live entertainment tax. One month later, in Terry v. Sapphire Gentlemen’s Club, the court ruled that dancers at Sapphire Gentlemen’s Club are employees and not independent contractors. As a result, Sapphire has to pay retroactive wages to the 6,500 dancers involved in the class-action suit.

Speaking of arguments about wages, Integrity Staffing Solutions, Inc. v. Busk is a notable ongoing U.S. Supreme Court case consider-ing whether workers at an Amazon warehouse in Las Vegas should be paid for mandatory security screen-ings conducted after their work shift has concluded. The screen-ings are meant to prevent theft but can take as long as 25 minutes;

employees believe they should be compensated for that time, while Amazon argues otherwise.

The Nevada District Court initially dismissed the case, but the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals reversed the decision. The U.S. Supreme Court heard oral argu-ments in October, and if it decides to reinterpret when work time be-gins and ends, the decision could impact many business and put mil-lions of dollars at stake.

Of a more high-profile nature is NV Transportation v. Uber Technolo-gies. On November 25, Washoe County District Judge Scott Freeman approved a preliminary injunction to halt Uber’s ride-shar-ing operations in Nevada. Freeman agreed with the Nevada Transpor-tation Authority that Uber was ille-gally operating here since it failed to comply with state-licensing requirements prior to launching service statewide in October.

The judge said that Uber’s non-compliance with state regulations potentially risked public safety. Uber countered that it shouldn’t be subject to state regulations because it’s not a transportation-services company but a technol-ogy company connecting custom-ers with independent contractors. However, not even Uber’s re-quirements of driver background checks and vehicle inspections swayed the judge from granting the injunction.

While the Uber saga has played out statewide for the past month,another legal controversy back in April generated national buzz: theintense standoff between ClivenBundy and the Bureau of Land Management, whose personnel sought to enforce a court order to stop Bundy’s cattle from graz-ing on federally owned land. After hundreds of armed supporters flocked to Bundy’s defense, BLM personnel withdrew for employee and public safety rather than escalate the situation. Since thestandoff ended, the BLM has saidit is attempting to resolve the matter in the courts. Meanwhile, Bundy and his cattle remain on the contested land.

Not to be left out, Nevada vot-ers were responsible for one of the year’s biggest legal decisions when they overwhelmingly ap-proved Question 1 during Novem-ber’s general election, creating an intermediate appellate court. Under the new setup, all district court appeals will still be filed with the Nevada Supreme Court, which will then assign cases to the new intermediate court. Prior to the passage of Question 1, Nevada was one of only 10 states in the country without a court of appeals.

➜ John Adams talked of the need for “a government of laws, and not of men,” while Frank Zappa called the United States “a na-tion of laws, badly written and randomly en-forced.” While Adams was the greater found-ing father, Zappa had a point: Who we are and what we think shapes our laws, and this is particularly true within each of our 50 states. Here are the seven most important people and events that have shaped Nevada law:

THE NEVADA CONSTITUTIONAL

CONVENTION Delegates met in Carson City in the summer of 1864 and wrote the docu-ment that governs us—a document that’s more detailed about individual liberties than the U.S. Constitution. How it divides power between the three governmental branches means legislators only meet every two years and don’t confirm the governor’s appoint-ments, setting in motion not only Nevada’s antiquated budgeting process, but also our libertarian approach to so many issues. Take note, Cliven Bundy: The Nevada Constitution also disclaims any right to the federal land that the U.S. government already owned, having acquired this area in the treaty that ended the Mexican-American War—meaning it never was Nevada’s land. Besides thereby depriving Nevada of much of a tax base, our constitution gave the mining industry a tax break that lives on to this day.

FELICE COHN The first Nevada-born woman (1878 in Carson City) to practice law here, she served as an assistant U.S. at-torney, was a leading advocate for women’s suffrage and a bankruptcy court referee. She also was one of the first women in the U.S. admitted to practice before the U.S. Supreme Court. She helped found the Nevada Federation of Business and Profes-sional Women’s Clubs, and was a longtime lobbyist on behalf of children’s and women’s rights. Women attorneys—indeed, a lot of Nevadans, period—stand on her shoulders.

THE FOLEY FAMILY Thomas Foley was the first to arrive, landing in Goldfield in 1906. His son Roger T. moved to Las Vegas to stay in 1928, became a district judge and then a federal judge, and heard, among other cases, Greenspun v. McCarran, in which Las Vegas Sun publisher Hank Greenspun sued U.S. Senator Pat McCarran—and almost every hotel-casino owner in town—for conspiring to deprive him of advertising because he had criticized McCarran. Foley’s even-handed hearing of the case enabled Greenspun to win a settlement, survive as a publisher and go on to play an important role in Nevada history (see, among other things, the com-munity of Green Valley). Roger Foley’s five

sons all became attorneys and politicians, with oldest son Roger D. also becoming a federal judge (George Foley Jr. continues the tradition as a federal magistrate). Roger D. Foley’s famous cases included Baneberry (in which he opened up the federal government to challenges from Nevada Test Site workers who had been victims of radiation exposure) and the Ash Meadows Desert Pupfish, which he protected from developers.

GRANT SAWYER AND BOB FAISS They’re a tag team. As governor, Sawyer pushed for the Nevada Equal Rights Commis-sion, which still deals with civil rights cases. He also revolutionized gaming regulation in the state with, among other things, the Black Book, barring certain unsavory characters from entering casinos. Entrants such as John Marshall and Tony Spilotro challenged the Black Book’s constitutionality, to no avail. Af-ter leaving office, Sawyer co-founded a major law firm whose specialties included repre-senting corporations that were just beginning to enter Nevada gaming. Of equal importance was Faiss, who was one of Sawyer’s aides as governor and also one of his law partners. Faiss wrote the original guidebook for the Ne-vada Gaming Commission and shaped many of the laws governing gaming in the state and, eventually, in other jurisdictions.

MGM GRAND HOTEL FIRE The November 21, 1980, fire killed 85 and injured more than 700. Its legal significance? In addition to many resulting lawsuits—2,000 plaintiffs and several hundred defendants—that led to the passage of laws to make Nevada buildings safer (sprinkler systems), the fire resulted in the influx of an army of lawyers who greatly expanded the legal profession here. How the MGM fire lawsuits were han-dled also influenced subsequent large-scale trials involving such topics as the effects of tobacco and breast implants.

HARRY CLAIBORNE A legendary Las Vegas attorney, Claiborne became a U.S. district judge in 1978. Federal officials almost im-mediately targeted him, believing him to be crooked mainly because of his being a great defense attorney who also represented Horseshoe owner Benny Binion. The feds gave immunity to brothel owner Joe Con-forte, who lied under oath about bribing Clai-borne. Those charges didn’t stick, but the in-vestigations found that Claiborne screwed up his taxes, and in 1986, he wound up being the first federal judge impeached, convicted and removed from office since the Civil War. The controversy over Clairborne’s case roiled Southern Nevada and raises questions to this day about the area’s image and the federal government’s dealings with Las Vegas.

THE NEVADA SUPREME COURT Not the current seven justices, but the group in the 1980s and 1990s who publicly fought over everything from political campaigns to an investigation into the actions of a Washoe County district court judge. Their fights—in-cluding demanding investigations into who leaked information, plus trying to block in-vestigations and interfering in cases—were a national embarrassment for the legal pro-fession. Only in the last few years has the state high court’s reputation recovered.

Laying Down the LawsFROM GAY MARRIAGE TO UBER, NEVADA HAS BEEN AT THE CENTER OF

SEVERAL KEY LEGAL MATTERS IN 2014 By Tye Masters

By Michael Green

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before he was the happiest Mayor on Earth, Oscar Good-

man was one of the most famous crimi-nal defense lawyers in the country, with a roster of underworld clients that ranged from Tony Spilotro to Meyer Lansky, the latter being one of the most important men in both organized crime and Las Vegas history (at the risk of sounding redundant). Not to mention, Goodman’s the attorney who scored an acquittal in the seemingly impossible Jimmy Chagra case, where the drug lord was implicated in the 1979 assassination of federal judge John Wood. We caught up with hizzoner to talk about grow-ing up with the law, his brush with O.J. Simpson’s double-murder trial and be-ing held in contempt of court.

Growing up as a son of a prosecutor, was

there any doubt you’d go into law? Oh, ab-solutely. I was going to be a coach. I was going to be a rabbi. I was going to be a lot of things, never even thinking of be-ing a lawyer. Then my wife said, “You’d better go to law school.” She made a very compelling argument that, when you’re a rabbi, you have 800 bosses, and I never liked a boss. As a coach, it’s so iffy that you could get a solid profession.

What was the case that led to you represent-

ing organized crime figures? By accident I became the country’s leading expert on wiretap cases. My wife, we would go out to dinner once a month. We went to the Hacienda. After dinner, she would take $10 and play blackjack. The dealer who

dealt her the cards became very friendly with me, and he called me [to handle his] bankruptcy. A couple of weeks after that, a phone call came into the pit at the Hacienda. It was from an organized crime fgure from the Northeast whose stepbrother had been arrested on the Dyer Act [a.k.a., the National Motor Ve-hicle Theft Act]. All they had to prove [to get a federal conviction] was a car was stolen and transported from one state to another. It was the kind of case you don’t win, but I didn’t know any better.

So the organized crime fgure calls into the pit at the Hacienda. The guy who an-swered the phone said, “Hello, what can I do for you?” He says, “Who’s the best criminal lawyer in Las Vegas?” Nothing changes in 50 years in Las Vegas. Instead of saying, “I don’t know,” he goes like this [covers receiver, whispers], “Who’s the best criminal lawyer in Las Vegas?” And the guy who dealt my wife the cards, who I did the bankruptcy for, said, “Call Oscar.” That’s where it all started. I won the case. I could try the case 1,000 times.

I would lose it 999 times, but somebody was shining on me.

The frst legal wiretap took place down in Miami. They had the public phones wiretapped. A father-son team were calling all over the country for line information—placing bets and ac-cepting bets and the like. One of the fellas providing this information was a bartender at the Golden Nugget. He got picked up on the wiretap.

They had about six, seven, eight de-fendants. I moved for a severance, be-cause my client was such a small fsh in a big pond. The judge would deny it. Every day for about a week and a half, I moved for the severance, because I haven’t heard my client’s name mentioned. Judge fnally says, “I’m granting the sev-erance.” [Meyer] Lansky’s lawyer was in-volved in the case. He says, “Why don’t you help us?” Here I was a young lawyer. It’s a great opportunity for me. Well, all [the other defendants] are found guilty. But the word gets out, this kid from Las Vegas, Goodman, he beat the case. Ev-

erybody assumed I was an expert on wiretaps, although my client was sev-ered out. They never tried him again.

There’s the famous footage of Frank Costel-

lo storming out of the Kefauver Hearings.

Did you ever have to work to keep a lid on

any of your clients in court? A couple of them. I was involved in the [Nicky] Scarfo case back in Philly, representing Philip Leonetti. They were a pretty hotheaded group of defendants. In the Chagra case, when the principal witness testifed, [Chagra] got up and called him a lying motherfucker right in front of the jury.

The most famous wasn’t a trial, but Frank Rosenthal in front of the Gaming Commission. He held a press confer-ence out there. But a guy like Spilotro never said anything.

There’s this image a lot of people have of

the tough, defiant wise guy in court, but

were they ever scared to go to trial? I have to believe. I’ve been held in contempt of court and was going to jail. Anybody

T H E L E G A L I S S U E

From Spilotro to O.J., Oscar Goodman recounts his eventful career as a defense attorney

who isn’t fearful of something like that, they have a screw loose. There’s noth-ing pleasant about it. But with the ex-ception of maybe one or two clients, they all showed up and went to trial. They fgured if they played they would pay. That’s the way it was. They were men about it, to be honest with you.

How did you find yourself in contempt

of court? I had a client, Natale Richi-chi—they called him Big Chris. He was supposedly the consiglieri for [John] Gotti. The government subpoenaed me before the grand jury. They wanted to fnd out who paid my fee and how much it was. I told them to drop dead.

They brought me before the judge, Phil Pro. And I knew what the law was, that my fee was not a confden-tial communication. But I was making a new argument that it undermined my client’s confdence in me. So I told him I’m not going to do it. The judge said, “You are going to do it, or else I’m holding you in contempt.”

The judge set a date. It seemed like every member of the bar was outside the courthouse with bullhorns saying, “Judge Pro, Let the O Go!” It was pretty dramatic. I get into court and I never showed any fear, but the prosecutor gets up, right before the judge is about to incarcerate me, and says, “You know something judge, jail doesn’t scare Goodman. You’ve got to hit him in his pocketbook.” Judge says, “Well, if that’s what you want, I’m going to fne him $25,000 and $2,500 a day hereafter.” I went [to Orange County] for [another] case, and there was a group of Strike Force attorneys having a convention there. A fella I had known said, “You’re in a lot of trouble. You know, they’re going to go for criminal contempt. You’re not budging. That’s real trouble, because then you lose your ticket [law license] and you go to prison.”

I went back and to Richichi and said, “Chris, I’m going to do whatever you want me to do here, but if they indict me, I won’t be able to represent you any-more.” He told me to give them whatev-er they want. I turned over the receipt, and because I’m a little smarter than they are, I turned it over in open court. It had “Anonymous” and the amount, but it didn’t do [the prosecutors] any good because I had already deposited it.

When I was under this contempt I had been retained to represent a fella up in Boston. I was in my room in the hotel with my wife when I got a phone call from somebody representing them-selves as O.J. [Simpson’s] agent. They wanted to send me $25,000 to retain me to represent him. We’re watching TV, and we’re seeing the white [Bronco] as the phone call was actually made. I toldhim, “I can’t even think of getting in-volved, because I’ve got a big problem. I may go to jail on contempt.” That’s when they went to Robert Shapiro.

Do you ever think about “what if”? It would have been a great case. My friends in Los Angeles always said there was no way Simpson could lose. When they moved

it out of [Brentwood] into downtown [Los Angeles], the case was over for all intents and purposes. I have no idea, to be honest. I don’t know if I would have been smart enough to come up with “If the glove doesn’t ft, you must acquit.” It would have been a nice case, though.

What was your strategy to get a jury on your

side? It’s like anything else. It’s why I was a halfway successful politician. I think jurors know when you’re trying to fool them. Jurors are very smart. Putting the 12 parts together and coming up with justice is a fascinating phenomenon.

I always was very honest. I rarely let my client take the witness stand. I felt I could do better in the closing argument than he could under cross-examina-tion. Basically, I tried all my cases the same way: I put the government on tri-al. If [the jurors] were offended enough by the government’s misconduct, then I would win the case. If they weren’t, I would not be so successful.

What was more satisfying: getting a win

in court or settling without shots fired?

I didn’t have any settlements to speak of. A guy like Spilotro, they offered le-thal injection or the electric chair. Nei-ther of them would have been satisfac-tory. All my clients were like that. I was the lawyer of last resort.

What did you feel like when you walked into

the courtroom? I felt great. A lot of law-yers always have other lawyers with them. I’d say 99 percent of my cases where I was representing a single de-fendant I was always by myself. In the Chagra case, it was almost David and Goliath. The courtroom was just flled with DEA [Drug Enforcement Ad-ministration] agents, IRS agents, FBI agents, local cops, paralegals, lawyers. It was like 1,000 people against poor David sitting there. It’s an awesome feeling. You have a person’s life in your hands. It’s like Spilotro said: “You know, this United States v. Anthony Spi-lotro, that doesn’t seem fair.” I always liked to represent the underdog. It’s why I can’t win a bet.

Do you miss the law? I miss certain as-pects, but I have a son who practices, and I have another son who’s a [justice of the peace]. Just as my father and myself would have been oil and water, even though there’s a great deal of love and affection between us, same thing.

What advice do you give to law students?

If you don’t love going to work every single day, go do something else. It’s a great profession. It’s a profession a little bit different than any other in the sense that a doctor has a closed door and speaks a language not every lay-person understands. A lawyer, at least a trial lawyer—and I wouldn’t want to be any other kind of lawyer—can’t be a phony. The jury speaks the same lan-guage that I speak, and they’d be able to see it in a New York second. You have to have a way about you. And my way was to attack the opposition.

➜ Constant change is sort of the status quo in the legal world, as new technologies, regulations and issues spring up seemingly daily. However, some fields are seeing more activity—and more advances—than others. Here’s an overview of seven specialties that are keeping the legal community in business.

HEALTH CARE

The Affordable Care Act (a.k.a. “Obamacare”) changed the health care game for many people and businesses. “When-ever major ‘disruptive’ legislation such as the Affordable Care Act becomes law, lawyers in the affected specialty spend an inordinate amount of time advising clients on new oppor-tunities and challenges that the legislation may present,” says Alan C. Sklar of Las Vegas law firm Sklar Williams PLLC. “To date, the bulk of our work arising from the ACA has been in the formation and organization of clients that are designated—or are seeking designation as—Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs) from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid.”

MARIJUANA

Legalization of medi-cal and/or recreational marijuana continues to spread across the nation. Applying for a li-cense to operate a mar-ijuana-related business can involve thousands of pages of paperwork. “It’s remarkable how something the people of Nevada made consti-tutional sat untouched for 14 years and then with a sudden dump of nutrient-rich convolu-tion seemingly grew an instant bumper crop of (sometimes contradic-tory) regulations from all quarters,” says Dayvid Figler, a Las Vegas law-yer who has worked on several successful mari-juana applications. “This degree of regulation is akin to opening a pawn-shop with gambling in a day-care center that serves alcohol.”

ENERGY

The energy sector has always dealt with regu-lation and legislation, but the steady develop-ment of new methods and technologies has increased legal activity. Leases and royalties for those that own oil-pro-ducing land have been complicated by hori-zontal drilling, fracking and other new extrac-tion methods—not to mention the challenges posed by communities that oppose fracking. Renewable energy has seen job growth in all areas, especially the legal side of the field: Many states require en-ergy providers to work toward increasing their volume of renewable energy, which requires legal help whether companies intend to comply with regulations or challenge them.

INTELLECTUAL

PROPERTY

The concept of “fair use” continues to evolve in our post-modern sample-and-satirize, ap-propriate-and-adapt era. There are still no hard-and-fast rules, which is why Google Books can scan an entire novel without the author’s permission, but a musi-cian can’t sample four notes of a song without receiving full licensing permission. Copyright infringement is also becoming increasingly complex in our Internet-linked global economy. There have been nu-merous legal challenges involving technology and software patents, and ongoing questions about the boundaries of pat-entable subject matter.

LABOR

As our economy in-creasingly moves toward using “contract work-ers” rather than employ-ees, legal disputes have risen about how a per-son qualifies as one or the other—and wrongly categorizing workers can lead to problems later on. Both FedEx and Sapphire Gentleman’s Club have recently lost class-action suits for mislabeling employees

as independent contrac-tors. Another question is the status of unpaid interns, and what duties they can perform and how many hours they can work before being considered employees. Other 21st-century legal ambiguities in the labor world involve employees using social media and personal devices to con-duct employer business.

ELDER LAW

As the baby boomer generation continues to get older, the legal issues associated with aging become more important. Families attempt to navigate both the health care and financial systems, trying to find a way to hold onto at least some of their loved one’s as-sets without sacrificing care. The best way to do this: Be proactive. “A big part of elder law is doing what you can to plan ahead, as there are more options when you have more time,” says Kim Boyer of Durham, Jones & Pinegar, a Las Vegas firm specializing in elder law. “You can get proper estate-plan-ning documents to plan for a possible nursing-home stay, as well as create specific asset-protection trusts,” she explains.

E-DISCOVERY

Emails, databases and other electronic records have become increasingly valuable as evidence in court cases: E-discovery is the process by which legal teams can find the oneincriminating messageor Web search among all the terabytes of data on a server. Electronic discovery affects cases in many fields of law; simply put, if parties are using electronic commu-nications or data storage, e-discovery will be part of the pre-trial discovery process. What is avail-able for search and how it will be searched—cod-ing or keywords, special-ized software, etc.— is something both parties have to determine with the help of e-discovery legal professionals.

What’s Trending NowWHETHER IT’S MARIJUANA OR E-DISCOVERY, SPECIALIZED LAW HAS GOTTEN

QUITE TECHNICAL IN THE 21ST CENTURY By Lissa Townsend Rodgers

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NIGHTLIFEYour city after dark and photos from the week’s hottest parties

Highly MOTi-vatedThe Dutch DJ reached out to Tiësto, and now he’s a star

By Kat Boehrer

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IN THIS AGE OF INFORMATION, it’s not uncommon to form a relationship with someone over social media be-fore ever meeting that person in real life. Dutch DJ MOTi—or Timo Romme if you’re checking his I.D.—made friends with EDM powerhouse Tiësto via Twitter, and was soon on the fast track to success. Impressed by a string of singles that MOTi sent to him over a short period of time, Tiësto has endorsed his new pro-tégé’s career with bookings to open for a number of shows across the U.S., including January 1 at Hakkasan.

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How did you connect with Tiësto

on Twitter?

Tiësto did a compilation album with Dance (RED) Save Lives. It was a free album to help raise money for AIDS awareness, and he put a track of mine on there. Afterward, he started following everyone who had a track on the album and I was like, “Oh, what’s this? Tiësto is following me on Twitter! What happened?” So I sent him a direct message and said, “What’s up? Can I send you some music?” And every track I sent to him, he liked. After four or fve tracks he said, “Why not do something together?” That was the start with Tiësto.

You’re good friends with Dutch DJ

Quintino, too, right? How do you guys

know each other?

We both started DJing about eight or nine years ago. The scene in Hol-land is really small. That’s why all of the Dutch DJs know each other. We

started being friends and hanging out and making music together. He used to live just around the corner from my place. We’ve been friends for a long time.

Who are your favorite producers to

work or hang out with?

We have a group of friends in Amster-dam: Kenneth G, Quintino, Martin Garrix—he was amazing to work with. It was fun to work with DVBBS. And, of course, with Tiësto. We’re all friends.

You have a slew of new releases coming

out. Do you produce them all at once or

make music on an ongoing basis?

It kinda depends. When I’m touring, I’m always working on my laptop. So it doesn’t matter if I’m at home or in the studio or my hotel room. I can always work. Sometimes I make a lot of tracks all at once, and sometimes I don’t make anything for two months be-cause I have [writer’s] block or some-

thing. I try to work as much as I can.

You’ve just completed your first headlining

tour. Any standout moments?

It was amazing, but at the same time scary. I’ve always toured with Tiësto in the States, but it was the frst time I went by myself. I think Webster Hall in New York City was amazing, because Tiësto came with me as a surprise guest and nobody knew. So I just pulled him onstage and people went nuts.

Where haven’t you played yet that is

on your list?

There are a lot of cities that I really want to play. This was a short tour, only 10 shows. I really wanna do Mi-ami. I’d love to do Atlantic City. And, of course, Vegas! I want to do a headlin-ing show in Vegas.

Have you made any plans to hit any

of those spots yet?

Yeah, I’ll be [in Miami] somewhere

between Christmas and New Year’s Eve. I think I’m doing fve or six shows that week, so I have to fy [somewhere new] every day.

That’s a lot of travel. How do you

recharge when you’re on the road?

I have to sleep a lot to make up for all of the traveling. And the drinking dur-ing all of the shows.

What gets you in the zone to make music?

I drink a lot of coffee.

Your new track is called “Ganja.”

What’s the inspiration behind it?

The line before the drop says some-thing about ganja. I worked on that track with Dzeko and Torres while we were in New York together a half-year ago. The title is purely based on the vocal sample.

So, do you love the ganja?

Well, I am from Amsterdam …

MOTi at Ultra Music Festival.

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THU 11 Have you ever found yourself in a costume shop wondering why the Sexy Santa costumes exist? We have. The answer is—among other unmen-tionable reasons—yuletide traditions such as Tao’s Bad Santa Party. The annual contest returns with a $5,000 prize for "Santa’s naughtiest helper" and sounds by DJ Five. (In the Venetian, 10 p.m., TaoLasVegas.com.)

FRI 12 Insert Coin(s) gets in the hol-iday spirit with 3 Kings, a se-ries of events paying homage to three infuential artists. Tonight’s debut highlights hits, remixes and covers from the catalogs of Stevie Wonder,

Michael Jackson and Prince spun by DJ88 and Peter Shal-voy. A portion of proceeds beneft the I Have a Dream Foundation for youth, and new coats and monetary do-nations will be accepted at the door. (512 Fremont St., 10 p.m., InsertCoinsLV.com.) At Life, Las Vegas’ very own Justin Blau (better known as 3Lau) makes his residency debut. (In SLS, 10:30 p.m., SLSLasVe-gas.com.) Vegas Seven’s Best Underground Leader, After, has mined the techno felds of gold to bring France’s Julian Jeweil to Artistic Armory. The Jul-tide Carol (kudos on that name) also features sets from Stellar, Spacebyrdz, Justin Baule, Rob Dub and Bad Beat. (5087 Arville St., 11 p.m., Facebook.com/AfterLasVegas.) Still feelin’ the spirit of the season? Swing by Chateau

with a new, unwrapped toy for complimentary entry and cocktail today, Saturday or Wednesday. Donations will be given to Toys for Tots. (In Paris, 10:30 p.m., ParisLasVegas.com.)

SAT 13 Get funked up at Beauty Bar’s second Saturday soiree Off the Wall. ISI Group will curate the live art during the “graffti disco” while a slew of local DJs spin soul, hip-hop, R&B and everything in between. (517 Fremont St., 9:30 p.m., TheBeautyBar.com.) Shift gears for Lockdown, the monthly medley of speed garage and drum 'n’ bass music. There will be drink specials, visuals by j4son, and FX Logik and Madame Filth on the turntables. Awesome,

right? And it’s housed at everyone’s favorite zombie-themed bar, The End. (4821 Spring Mountain Rd., 10 p.m., Facebook.com/LockdownLV.)

SUN 14 It’s time again for late-after-noon imbibing at Hyde, and The Grinch Who Stole XIV Vegas Sessions brings an early dose of Christmas. (Yes, you can recycle that sexy San-ta outft!) But will you hear any Christmas songs in the mix? Only if you made the Nice List. (In Bellagio, 6 p.m., HydeBellagio.com.) Afterward, head to Hakkasan to see Fer-gie DJ in the booth. The club will close for a holiday break tomorrow through December 26. (In MGM Grand, 10:30 p.m., HakkasanLV.com.)

MON 15 Got a case of the Mondays? Nothing cures it quite like German trance duo Cosmic Gate at Marquee. These two refuse to “just press play,” telling MagneticMag.com in August “[We] follow our intuition when it comes to the next track to play or how to build a set.” (In the Cosmopoli-tan, 10:30 p.m., MarqueeLasVe-gas.com.)

TUE 16 To cure a case of the Tuesdays (trust us—it’s a thing) visit Linq for Winter Parq. The usual pre-Hump Day fun (si-

lent disco at 9:30 p.m., half-off the High Roller with local ID) is still in effect, however, there is now a tubing hill with real snow in the parking lot. Oh, yeah, and a bar. Because Vegas. (TheLinq.com.)

WED 17 “Dear Santa: All I want for Christmas is a $50 gift card to Crazy Horse III.” Sound like your wish list? Well, you’re in luck! The venue will give away such gifts (and offer an open bar 10 p.m.-midnight) during Neon Flow. Just look for Santa’s elves working the North Pole. (3525 W. Russell Rd., 10 p.m., CrazyHorse3.com.) Oh, and before we forget, this is your last opportunity to RSVP at SpyOnVegas.com for Industry Skate Wednes-days at the Boulevard Pool. Get free skating access and only pay $5 for skates. (At the Cosmopolitan, 8 p.m., Cosmo-politanLasVegas.com.)

ByCamilleCannon

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Cannon

Cosmic Gate.

DJ Five.

Madame

Filth.

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ARTISAN1501 W. Sahara Ave.

[ UPCOMING ]

Dec. 12 Sound with Justin Hoffman, Frank Richards

and Eddie McDonald

Dec. 13 M!ke Attack and Chris Aurelius spin

Dec. 14 Social Sundays with Justin Key

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DRAI’S NIGHTCLUBThe Cromwell

[ UPCOMING ]

Dec. 11 DJ Skratchy spins

Dec. 12 Borgeous spins

Dec. 13 Makj spins

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HYDEBellagio

[ UPCOMING ]

Dec. 11 Live Music Thursdays with Patrick Sieben

Dec. 12 DJ Scooter spins

Dec. 13 Joe Maz spins

PRESENTS

NEW YEAR’S EVE 2015

Must be 21+ with valid ID. Subject to capacity.

Dress code strictly enforced. Management reserves all rights.

Feel The SparkOpen Bar Packages • 10pm - Midnight Pre-sale tickets starting at $35

Wednesday, December 31Wednesday, December 31Wednesday, December 31

Advance ticket sales available at luxor.comor call 702.262.4529

PARTIES

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TAOThe Venetian

[ UPCOMING ]

Dec. 11 Bad Santa Party

Dec. 12 Four Color Zack spins

Dec. 13 Justin Credible spins

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[ UPCOMING ]

Dec. 12 3LAU spins

Dec. 13 EC Twins and Bynon spin

Dec. 14 Zen Freeman spins

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Restaurant reviews, news and a memorable French-inspired holiday cocktail

“Everybody would say, ‘We can’t get this kind of food

on the Strip—simple comfort food at a reasonable

price.’ And that’s what struck a chord.” {PAGE 64}

Swimming Upstream

Bocho flls a fsh niche

Downtown, but doesn’t quite hit the gourmet mark

By Al Mancini

ONE THING THE DOWNTOWN DINING SCENE HAS BEEN sadly missing for years (at least outside of casi-nos) is sushi. Dan Coughlin has fnally changed that with Bocho in the John E. Carson Hotel.

Coughlin is particularly suited to bringing raw fsh to the Fremont East area, having brought the neighborhood its frst serious restaurant with Le Thai. His reputation among locals and their crav-ing for sushi have made his new spot an almost overnight success. (When I visited on a recent Wednesday, there was a 30-minute wait for a seat.) But is it good? The answer really depends on what you’re looking for in a sushi spot.

I should start by saying that Bocho is a beauti-ful two-story space, with the type of modern minimalist décor you’d expect in this neighbor-hood. The frst foor is dominated by the sushi bar, while the second is reserved for tables and a midsize bar—the kind that serves booze, not fsh. Two private dining areas are expected to double as karaoke rooms. Seating can be a little cramped, but that’s the norm when dining in an up-and-coming urban neighborhood.

When I toured the space with Coughlin a few weeks before it opened, he told me the emphasis would be on sashimi, not specialty rolls, which was music to my ears. He seems to have changed his mind, however, as there are 19 of the crazy American-style rolls on the menu, the kind that feature multiple types of fsh paired with everything from cream cheese to avocado, often unrecognizable under various sauces and mayo, and occasionally deep fried. (I suppose you have to give the people what they want.) There’s also a full page of hot and cold appetizers and entrées, as well as a complete sushi menu.

The most interesting thing to me, however, is the $75 omakase (daily chef’s tasting) menu—an extremely pricey commitment for a Downtown restaurant. In Bocho’s defense, it’s a lot of food! While the menu states seven courses, one of those single courses when I visited was actually a quartet of salads and pokes. My dinner for two could easily have fed four, and it included two pitchers of soju cocktails.

The weird thing about this omakase, however, is that it’s dominated by raw seafood—which is not the norm in most restaurants where I’ve dined.

An assortment of

sushi and sashimi

offered at Bocho.

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On the night I visited, that includ-ed two types of poke, a ridiculously huge sashimi boat, a nigiri course and a whole Spanish mackerel. The prob-lem is, they were not of the gourmet quality you expect at this price point.

For a sushi snob like me, in addi-tion to high-quality fsh, great sushi and sashimi require chefs with se-rious knife skills. Slicing fsh is a pre-cise, delicate art. And while the fsh at Bocho was high quality, the cuts I got were awkward and unattractive. Some were tough to handle with chopsticks. And many just didn’t feel right as I chewed them, indicating that the chef didn’t understand which cuts of fsh should be cut against the grain, and which should be cut with it.

Now I’ll admit there’s a restaurant in my neighborhood that offers a similar product—good fsh cut carelessly—which I still often recom-

mend. But that’s because they offer all-you-can-eat sushi and sashimi for less than $30. It’s a bargain play; a $75 meal isn’t. And given how much of my dinner went uneaten, I’d have preferred that Bocho serve me less food that was better prepared.

Moving past the raw seafood, the rest of my meal drew mixed reactions. I enjoyed an egg custard starter. Baby clams in dashi were de-licious. The yellowtail collar was a bit dry, but well seasoned. But the beef tataki was almost too tough to eat.

When I returned a few days later, I sampled some more sashimi and sushi that was just slightly better. I also tried some of the specialty su-shi rolls that were much larger and better than I’ve had at most places. I enjoyed the Spider Roll, but as I’ve said, that’s not really my thing.

If you’re Downtown and craving sushi, Bocho is defnitely a god-

send. The setting is funky. The a la carte prices are attractive. The por-tions are huge. And the fsh is high quality. If you’re looking for a gour-met omakase experience, however, I’d suggest you keep searching.

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WINTER EATS, INDUSTRY PIZZA AND MILK-SHAKES FOR ALLThe first wet, dreary days of the season are our

only real indicator that it’s winter in the desert.

This coincides with the start of comfort-food

season, where food and beverages that make us

feel warm and fuzzy hold us over in hibernation.

To keep things fresh, Andrea’s (in Encore,

702-770-3463, WynnLasVegas.com) offers

rotating menus for the its Winter Wine-derland

(it’s a stretch, but we’ll take it) that combines the

talents of both chef Joe Elevado and sommelier

Samuel Roe. Everyone’s favorite food-sharing

vehicle, small plates, are specially priced and

paired with wines and cocktails. The first

week’s noshes from December 1-7 include

hamachi sashimi with crispy garlic, pickled

cherry pepper and sudachi soy ($11), and you can

slip into something more comfortable with an

accompanying glass of Sonoma Coma pinot noir

($9). Through December 21 (keeping in mind the

restaurant is closed Dec. 14-18), you’ll get into

interesting bites, such as crispy pork korokke

(or croquettes), served with radish and aioli

($11) and eggplant miso with shrimp, scallops

and mayo ($9), while you can sip on a barrel-

aged Negroni ($17). The final week of the year,

the specials turn to fusion with short-rib poutine

with wasabi demi-glace ($10) and duck confit lo

mein ($10), both of which can equally be served

by a fantastic glass of Justin cabernet ($9).

Feeling more casual? Industry nights are

usually reserved for Sundays and Mondays, but

Thursdays at Five50 Pizza Bar (in Aria, 877-

230-2742) show hospitality folks some love with

the joint’s perfectly blistered pies. Your employee

ID or business card scores half-off all pizza and

draft selections from 9 p.m. to midnight, turning

industry professionals into #PizzaPros.

This may not be the right time of the year to

think of cold treats, but we’ll categorize a milk-

shake bar in the “comfort food” genre. At any

rate, Sticks & Shakes is bringing all the boys to

the yard at both the Galleria at Sunset and Fash-

ion Show on the Strip. As the name suggests,

frozen treats come in popsicle or concrete-form,

but are completely customizable. Sticks can

start with gelato, sorbet or cakes as a base that

is coated and topped with such bits as crushed

Oreos and hazelnuts. Also, if you miss your

alcohol being frozen, sorbet sticks can be booze

infused—don’t say we didn’t warn you about the

mixed berry Long Island Iced Tea (or Long Island

Iced Teas in general). The shakes take on more

than 500 different combinations, all starting with

a neutral gelato base upon which you can build

your own flavors thanks to tons of candy. There

are also Shock Shakes, such as Vegas Wings,

made with Red Bull, PopRocks and Sour Skittles,

for a little extra pick-me-up.

Grace Bascos eats, sleeps, raves and repeats.

Read more from Grace at VegasSeven.com/

DishingWithGrace, as well as on her dining-

and-music blog, FoodPlusTechno.com.

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Get the latest on local restaurant openings and closings, interviews with top chefs, cocktail recipes, menu previews and more in our weekly “Sips and Bites” newsletter. Subscribe at VegasSeven.com/SipsAndBites.

Baby clams in dashi broth and a

sashimi boat.

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IF YOU THINK A CASINO IN THE HEART OF Las Vegas Boulevard seems like an odd location for a restaurant called Off the Strip, you’re not alone. But as Tom Goldsbury and I chat just across the way from his new restaurant, slated to open December 24 in the Linq’s shopping promenade, he makes it sound logical. “If I’m standing here, and you ask me where the Strip is, I’m gonna point that way,” he says. More importantly, the restaurant is an extension of his Southern Highlands spot of the same name, which he opened with his brother, Al Hubbard. The pair always dreamed of bringing their concept to a Strip hotel. Unfortunately, Hubbard died four years ago. But Goldsbury is about to realize their vision.

After operating a restaurant to-gether in New York, Goldsbury and Hubbard moved to Las Vegas 30 years ago. Both worked at various Strip locations over the years: Goldsbury tended bar at Smith & Wollensky for a decade, and Hubbard worked as a chef at the Luxor, MGM Grand and Impe-rial Palace. In 2007, they decided it was time to go into business for them-selves again, and the next year opened a casual Italian/American restaurant in Southern Highlands.

Off the Strip was a hit with locals and—surprisingly—tourists. The latter were the ones who originally planted the seeds of expansion. “We had a huge international following because of a stellar Trip Advisor review,”

Goldsbury says. “And everybody would say, ‘We can’t get this kind of food on the Strip—simple comfort food at a reasonable price.’ And that’s what struck a chord.”

The place also caught the attention of several Caesars Entertainment execu-tives who lived in the neighborhood. And in 2010, Rick Mazer (then, presi-dent of Harrah’s, the Flamingo and the Quad hotel-casinos) approached the brothers about participating in the Flamingo/Quad redevelopment project. Hubbard, who had recently been diagnosed with stage-four brain cancer, died just a few months later.

The tragedy didn’t deter Goldsbury from moving forward with their dream. Off the Strip will be acces-

Off the Strip Is On Its WayHow a humble neighborhood joint gets catapulted to the big time

and makes two brothers’ dreams a reality

By Al Mancini

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Tom Goldsbury oversees construction at Off the Strip in the Linq.

sible from both the hotel and the shopping promenade. The two-story, 11,000-square-foot restaurant will be open 24 hours, offering breakfast, lunch and dinner. The top foor will be a chophouse and meeting space. The menu on the ground foor will stick primarily to the American and Italian cuisine of the original restaurant, with some additions intended to attract health-conscious diners. “All of the guys I know at XS and all the nightclubs, when they get off at 3, 4 or 5 in the morning, they might not want to eat waffes, pancakes and carbohydrates,” Goldsbury says. “Most of them are working out, doing crunches all day. So I’ll have a Fresh & Fit menu for them.”

The restaurant is hoping to attract late-night diners from both the Linq and the Flamingo. And all of the food might even eventually be available to guests at the Linq via room service. It’s an ambitious undertaking, and Goldsbury is certain his brother would be pleased.

“Being that we started here 30 years ago, and he was a relatively small, unknown cook,” he says, “to have this opportunity that Caesars has offered us, he’d be more than proud.”

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DRINKING

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[ SCENE STIRS ]

LOCAL F&B DYNAMOS SHARE THEIR SECRET PET PROJECTS. PART 2: THIS LITTLE CIDER COMES TO MARKETBrett Ottolenghi’s been holding out on us! The

owner of Artisanal Foods on East Sunset Road

and purveyor of gourmet ingredients keeps Las

Vegas’ pro and home chefs in truffles, foie gras

and jamón Ibérico de bellota. But he has also very

recently and very quietly begun distributing cans

and kegs of his family’s apple cider to restau-

rants and bars around town—five varieties, all of

which are raw, natural and low in calories.

There’s no shortage of similarly hipsterific

products out in the market, all of them straining

for an air of homey authenticity and a share of

your imbibable discretionary income. But Jack’s

Hard Cider (JacksHardCider.com) is the real

deal, named for Ottolenghi’s grandfather, Jack

Hauser, who started working for Musselman

Foods in 1936 and later served as its president

from 1944-1979. It was Jack who also planted the

family’s own apple orchards in the 1940s, but in

the 1980s, the production-apple market soured.

“Chinese apple juice concentrate and apple

products took [over] the U.S. market for produc-

tion apples,” Ottolenghi says. And it’s not like

the family could suddenly redirect its apples to

supermarkets. “Production apples are grown with

few sprays, and don’t look as perfect as most

fresh fruit in grocery stores. For 20 years we

operated the orchard at a loss.” It was then that

Ottolenghi proposed using the apples for cider.

That was nine years ago. For the last seven,

Jack’s has been produced and canned at the

family’s Hauser Estate Winery, just eight miles

west of Historic Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, from

apples native to Adams County. It took another

five years for Ottolenghi to obtain a wholesale

liquor license and bring the cider to Nevada. “I

started the paperwork in 2009,” he says. “And

that was with a consultant.”

The flagship, Jack’s Hard Cider, is sharply dry

at 100 calories and 5.5 percent alcohol. I loved

it before dinner, in place of a dry white wine or

aperitif to whet the appetite. Just a touch sweeter

and rounder was the Helen’s Blend ($6 at Atomic

Liquors) at 180 calories and 5 percent, and named

for Ottolenghi’s grandmother. There are also

three seasonal varieties: a single-orchard label,

one fermented with estate-grown peaches and

a shandy, brewed with coriander,

bitter and sweet orange

peel and lemon.

The only question

is, can Jack’s keep

up with demand?

The brand cur-

rently counts its

production in just

thousands of gal-

lons per year—a

drop in the apple

bucket compared

with other

ciders. Ottolenghi

doesn’t seem too

worried: “It’s a good

problem to have.” – X.W.

➜ It was dinnertime in Dijon, France. I was in a foul mood—hangry and jetlagged. That’s when a mountain of a bistro owner presented me with a shot. Of all things? My in-credulity lasted only until I had drained the glass: Marc de Bourgogne (think grappa, but with a French accent) layered atop crème de cassis de Dijon, mother’s milk in this town where every other shop sold either cassis prod-ucts or mustard. It was viscous, strong, warming, tangy and earthy. In other words, perfect.

Spirits lifted, I jotted down the ingredients, acquired a bottle each and forgot about them ... till recently, when Wirtz Bev-erage of Nevada’s Andrew Pollard and I conspired on a cocktail made with marc, Giffard crème de cassis, lemon sour, aromatic bitters, sage and Cham-pagne—the perfect drink to serve friends and fam-ily during the holidays!

Alas, there’s no marc to be had in Las Vegas. But it’s the thought that counts anyway, n’est-ce pas?

Get the recipe at VegasSev-en.com/CocktailCulture.

Marc My Words

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A&EMovies, music, stage and a nut that’s worth cracking

“He never just sits down and plays the notes on the page. He’s all

about bringing out the best in the singer or instrumentalist he’s

playing with. It’s like he taps into your skull.” MUSIC {PAGE 72}

➜ Quick sprint along this man’s timeline:

FIRST STOP: Hell.“I lived out of garbage cans for the eight months I lived on the street,” says veter-an Las Vegan but rookie Strip headliner Billy Hufsey, rewinding his memory 34 years, to 1980 Los Angeles. Goals? Daytime auditions. Nighttime survival. “It was an arduous time. I had E. coli. I woke up with guns at my head. I stayed behind this one building where the heat got pushed out, so it was warm. But it was unfltered air, so I got pneumonia, bronchitis and scar tissue on my lung. But ya do what ya gotta do.”

NEXT STOP: Breakthrough.Series stardom arrived in his twenty-something salad days, 1983-87. What in? Sing along: FAME!/I’m gonna make it to heaven/Light up the sky like a fame/FAME!/I’m gonna live forever/Baby remember my name. And for a time, we did remem-ber (re-MEM-ber/re-MEM-ber/ re-MEM-ber) Hufsey’s back-fipping jazz-dance stu-dent, Christopher Donlon, fying across the foor and scrambling halfway up the damn walls. Giving girls the sweats.

Remember the nearly nekked, Billy-by-the-steaming-shower poster—all ripped, glistening bod and jet-black curls run amok, only his bashful privates tak-ing refuge behind a towel? Then came a daytime soap—like sands through an hourglass, so were the Days of His Life, 1987-91. Bangin’ around the industry followed, bouncing gig to gig. Married … With Children and Webster, anyone? How about, um, Crazy Girls Undercover?

NEXT STOP: Trouble and Transition.There’s an unwelcome intruder: skin cancer. He kicked its ass. Backpedaling from The Biz, he struggled through other medical miseries: misaligned discs in his neck, exploding into grand-scale pain. Cue banking, real estate and venture cap-italism endeavors born of an entrepre-neurial acumen—successful, proftable, but where’s the pizzazz, the adulation, the freakin’ spotlight when building strip malls? Then enter (eww) reality TV, like VH1’s Confessions of a Teen Idol, etcetera. Action!—and fade in on career fadeouts, Hollywood’s chew-up/spit-out story.

NEXT STOP: Upswing.Parachuting back into The Biz in elder-statesman-style, Hufsey nutures another side of himself as kid-star agent and coach-teacher. “C’mon, you went up there like you took fve Valium!” Hufsey says—booms, really—to a 12-year-old

Baby, Remember His FameLong past ’80s stardom, Billy Hufsey plays the fame game in

the classroom—and now on a Planet Hollywood stage

By Steve Bornfeld

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singing hopeful who’s not quite brin-gin’ it in front of classmates at the Hollywood Bound Acting Academy on South Cimarron Road. “This is not a business for sissies.”

NEXT STOP: Tonight. And every night (except Wednesdays). Fame!/I’m gonna live forever/I’m gonna learn how to fy/High!/I feel it coming to-gether/People will see me and cry. That’s Billy Hufsey, singing (nostalgically) to open Celebrity Idols: Movies and Music, the new revue he top-lines at Planet Hollywood’s Sin City Theatre, in his full-circle return to performing.

Life can be one hell of a journey.

* * * * *

What’s left to know, or at least highlight, about 56-year-old, jack-of-multiple-trades Hufsey? That, pre-homelessness/pre-Fame, he was an un-defeated Golden Gloves boxer before a hyper-extended elbow KO’d his dreams of pugilistic glory in the Olympics? That in 1979, pop-cul-ture eons before Dancing With the Stars, he won the U.S. Singles Dancing Championship? That, as current child sensation Asia Monet Ray’s man-ager, he was featured in this season’s Lifetime docu-series, Raising Asia?

Yes, but more to the point: Billy Hufsey is a Big Personality encased in a Big Man. Beefy and muscular, tanned and passionate, he sometimes tips into gush-speak, spraying phrases such as “giving love,” “so, so, so blessed” and “putting a smile on people’s hearts.”

And he’s a perpetual-motion testa-

ment to the power of relentlessness. “My mother’s philosophy was, when

you think you have exhausted every possibility, know you have not,” says Hufsey, who is a challenge for inter-viewers because he forces us to jot down almost as many exclamation points as actual words, both often sandwiched between boisterous laughs.

“I told my dad I wanted to act, and he said, ‘What? You can’t act!’” Hufsey remembers about his early career stirrings growing up in Brook Park, Ohio, just outside Cleveland. “I also said I wanted to become a singer. He said, ‘Singer? When you sing I have to put earmuffs on!’ I said I wanted to be a dancer. He said, ‘You have no rhythm!’ But he and my mother were there at every performance.”

Performances now are at Celebrity Idols, his frst stage work since 2000, when he starred in Dancing to the Hits

at the former Flamingo Hilton Laughlin. Idols—which he agreed to do because co-producer Nannette Barbera, his pal and onetime dance colleague, asked him to—is a potpourri of tributes to a stable of celebs including John Travolta, Jerry Lee Lewis, Carrie Under-wood and Billy Idol, plus iconic flms and cultural trends. En-

ergetic singers and dancers assist the star, who now employs his body—site of nine medical procedures triggered by injuries over the decades—for gag lines, not leg splits.

“I’ve got a screw in this foot, a screw in that foot, a screw in this knee, a screw in that knee,” he tells the audience at a recent show.

“I’m all screwed up!” What he’s given up in dancing, he makes up for in song, and in heart: kibitzing with the front row; blowing sax on “Greased Lightning”; cracking rim-shot jokes (“I tried to open a Big and Tall store in Tokyo”); and belting out “Great Balls of Fire,” “Johnny B. Goode,” “Mony Mony” and “Open Arms.”

Just shy of the fnale, Hufsey invites one of his teen/pre-teen students—out of hundreds he’s prepped and placed in scores of TV shows and flms—to knock out a chorus or two onstage. Then he stands by, radiating 1,000-watt pride.

* * * * *

The journey to that stage begins in this room. Students try out scenes and songs in a small classroom in a modest suite in a nondescript of-fce building on the Valley’s west side. They’re animated, passionate and a tad nervous. Leaning back and rocking in his chair in the rear of the room, Hufsey cajoles, barks, ap-plauds, giggles, evaluates—all of it cas-cading out of him like a waterfall.

“Get it out there. Stop that! Get that mouth out there! You’ve got to be more aggressive. … That’s much better, but 99 percent of the time, you’re go-ing to have a casting director who’s 70 years old. You’ve got to sing like you’re

singing to a pretty girl. … Here’s a little trick, honey: When you don’t have a large voice, you come down stage. … Gimme attitude, ’cause you got it. Let’s go! … That’s what you have to start with, that much energy, because we don’t usually get a second chance. … You have to say that my job is to go in there, kick ’em right in the face, have them chase me down the hall—‘Could you come back tomorrow at 12?’”

Verdict on Hufsey the mentor? Ask the parents:

• “Thanks to Billy, some of the kids here know more than some adults who are teaching classes,” says Ed Whitesell, whose son, Will, joined a national tour of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert.

• “He’s a great infuence on all the kids, amazing,” says Danielle Ross,

whose son, Tyler, is a student. “He’s very outgoing, very person-able and has a great heart.”

Ask the kids:• “He’s really funny and he mo-

tivates us.” (Will Whitesell, 12)• “I used to be in the theatri-

cal business [translation: school plays] but he helped me get out of that, all the big emotions. He taught me not to overact, just play it as if it were a real-life thing.” (Tyler Ross, 13)

• “I started out in the beginning classes, but then I heard about Billy, who is more of an advanced coach. And I’ve been working a lot since I started Billy’s class.” (Joseph Huebner, 16)

• “He understands me as a dancer, where I’m coming from, why I do certain things. I some-

times think, oh, my God, I’m with him?—wow!” (Kalen Bull, 13)

Class is over. Kids don’t fle out—they bolt toward him like a cluster of little magnets whooshing toward the giant magnet, crowding him, hugging him, hanging on him. Grinning broadly, he’s clearly tickled by their breathless efforts to snatch his attention. Yes, he loves it. They just might love it more.

* * * * *

Boomerang back to that timeline.

THIS STOP: National Resurrection.Living the Dream: Seven Key Principles for Success (self-published, $20)—his book that’s part biography, part mo-tivational life lessons—was published this year. Plus his new EP, The Lover in Me, has been performing well on the adult-contemporary charts. If this dude ever gets melancholy, as most of us occasionally do, his knack for con-cealment speaks to his acting chops. That internal engine, which he always seems to be gunning, pedal-to-the-metal style, speaks to everything else.

“I’m always going to give you the best Billy I can give you,” Hufsey says. “When they put that last nail in the coffn, I’ll be singing that last song.”

NEXT STOP: Just wait for it …

CELEBRITY IDOLS:

MOVIES AND MUSIC,

STARRING BILLY

HUFSEY

7 p.m. Thu-Tue, Sin

City Theatre at Planet

Hollywood, $60-

$80, 702-777-7776,

IdolsTheShow.com.

From a late-’80s headshot to his new

show Celebrity Idols, Billy Hufsey shines.

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SOMETHING TO “SHOUT” ABOUT

Tears for Fears has been prepping their

first album in 10 years and whetting fans’

appetites with covers of Arcade Fire and

Hot Chip. All this, on top of a deluxe reissue

of Songs From the Big Chair. Tears for Fears

plays the Pearl on Dec. 13 ($43-$103).

BEING BILLY Smashing Pumpkins has

a new lineup: Brad Wilk (Rage Against the

Machine) and Mark Stoermer (the Killers)

join Billy Corgan and Jeff Schroeder.

Expect to hear “Being Beige” and “Tiberius”

from Monuments to an Elegy when they hit

Brooklyn Bowl on Dec. 13 ($58-$60.50).

ON SALE NOW Billy Idol, the snarling,

leather-clad singer of “Rebel Yell” and

“White Wedding” has a new album (Kings

& Queens of the Underground) and an

ambitious tour schedule—not bad for 59.

He plays the Cosmopolitan on Feb. 21

($50-$75).

NUTCRACKER

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[ I WANT THAT BOOK ]

The Year of Reading Dangerously:

How Fifty Great Books (and Two

Not-So-Great Ones) Saved My

Life (Harper Perennial, $15) is

booklover Andy Miller’s attempt

to become well read in a single

year by tackling 50 classics as

he approaches his 40th birthday.

Starting with Bulgakov’s Master

and Margarita and breezing

through everyone from Austen to

Eliot to Tolstoy, Miller weaves a

compelling narrative about why

we read what we read, and why

classics matter. – M. Scott Krause

NUTCRACKER, SWEET! Nevada Ballet Theatre’s The Nutcracker offers something slightly strange. “Think of it as a

Tim Burton-meets-Dr.-Seuss take on the classic," artistic director James Canfield says. “It’s a little forward thinking, but the narrative is still there.”

Costumes, choreography and the setting are all enhanced. Canfield took an exaggerated approach—placing the audience in the shoes of 7-year-old

Clara. “The idea of ‘bigger than life’ is how we see things as a child,” he says. “How do we reinvent that, reimagine it so an adult can see it through

the eyes of a child again?” The answer is found in a 40-foot-tall dollhouse and the enormous, colorful costume of Mother Ginger. But there is

another reason for the goal of childlike amazement. Canfield hopes to re-create the Strip’s “wow” factor. “Shows in Las Vegas are like nowhere

else in the world because they’re epic in scale,” he says. “We tried to have that as an experience. The scale of it is definitely like nowhere else in the

world, I can guarantee you that.” The Smith Center, various times Dec. 13-21, $29 and up, 702-749-2000; NevadaBallet.com. – Ian Caramanzana

KÀ’S BATTLE SCENE IS RESTOREDThe show must go on is not just the law

of Las Vegas, but anywhere there are

performers and an audience. And the

cast of Cirque du Soleil’s Kà have learned

more about carrying on in the face of

adversity—and tragedy—than most per-

formers can imagine. On June 29, 2013,

Sarah Guyard-Guillot died after a fall

while performing in Kà. The production

was briefly closed and then reopened, but

with the final battle scene (in which her

fall occurred) replaced by a film.

On December 12, Kà will return to

battle with a modified version of the

scene. “It’s integral to the story, the final

scene of good vs. evil,” says Calum Pear-

son, vice president of Cirque du Soleil’s

Resident Shows Division. He went on to

explain that “no one thing” caused the

accident, but rather “a chain of events.”

Cirque performer Marc-Antoine

Picard was onstage during last year’s

tragedy and now he is act captain for

the new battle scene, a role he sought

out. “It meant a lot to me to put the act

together and bring it back to the show.”

The new version of the scene is still

an exciting fight between the forces

of light and darkness, played out on a

vertical stage as though the audience

is watching it from above. There have

been changes in the rigging and backup

computer systems added; the perform-

ers have slowed their speed and altered

some movement.

What does Picard hope audi-

ences take from the new scene when

it premieres? “I hope they are happy. I

hope they will be entertained,” he says,

“That’s what I love to do.” It’s what all

performers love to do and why the show

must, finally, go on.

– Lissa Townsend Rodgers

Kà's vertical stage.

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RED ALL OVER

Santa Claus Conquers the Martians is a

so-bad-it's-good kinda movie released

in 1964. And it only gets better as a live

production. Foam tomatoes are provided

to attendees at Onyx Theatre, where

it’s staged select dates through Dec. 27.

Discounted tickets for “sexy” elves and

martians! OnyxTheatre.com.

MORE OF ZADORA

Actress/singer Pia Zadora (pictured)

played a pint-size extraterrestrial in the

above-mentioned Santa film. Now 61,

she’s home at Piero’s Italian Cuisine for

the holidays. She’ll serenade you with

Christmas tunes Dec. 12-13, 19-20 and New

Year’s Eve. We hear her old friend St. Nick

stops by, too. PierosCuisine.com.

BEYOND CITY LIMITS

Artist David Ryan has exhibited in Paris,

New York and Los Angeles. Some of his

paintings are on display at The Smith

Center. But the Las Vegan’s first solo

show is happening now … at MCQ Fine

Art Advisory. You can join him at the

opening holiday soiree Dec. 11, or see his

colorful works on display through Jan. 30.

MCQFineArt.com

STILL SHINING BRIGHT

In November 2013, Rock of Ages actor Mark

Shunock assembled the first Mondays

Dark. Now the monthly charity fundraiser

rings in one year with a swarm of celebrity

appearances and performances. This

edition is so big, in fact, it’s happening at

The Joint, instead of its usual, cozier home

in Vinyl. HardRockHotel.com.

The

HITLIST

TARGETING THIS WEEK'S

MOST-WANTED EVENTS

By Camille Cannon

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KRISTEN HERTZENBERG’S SINGING VOICE IS A GIFT. The former Phantom–The Las Vegas Spectacular co-lead can tear up a blues number, navigate the twists and turns of an operatic piece or perform a humble camp-fre folk song ... and she can do all these things one after the other, without a break. That’s a gift, real and true.

At 2 and 7 p.m. December 13, Hertzenberg and pianist Philip Fortenberry will perform Holidays From the Heart, featuring songs from their 2011 album of the same name, at Cabaret Jazz at The Smith Center ($26-$36). Before you recoil in fear—more holiday music?—know that Hertzenberg and Fortenberry aren’t re-gifting junk.

“We’re defnitely going to do some songs you don’t hear in regular rotation on the radio and in depart-ment stores,” Hertzenberg says. “There are some songs we hadn’t even heard before we recorded the album; we dug them up doing research. … Phil and I get burnt out on holiday music, too.”

Expect a lively program that draws from Broadway tradition and the more personal realm of the singer-songwriter. Past Cabaret Jazz shows by Hertzenberg have included nods to the Indigo Girls and Rufus Wain-wright; she names Lyle Lovett as one of her inspirations.

“We’re doing a few unexpected things, and a few unexpected moods, too,” Hertzenberg says. “It’s not just going to be a show full of cheerfulness. We’re trying to dive into all the different aspects of what Christmas means to different people.”

What Christmas means to Hertzenberg is another opportunity to perform with a collaborator whose work she’s admired since they frst played together in 2007. “He’s an amazing listener. He never just sits down and plays the notes on the page. He’s all about bringing out the best in the singer or instrumentalist he’s playing with. It’s like he taps into your skull.”

Hertzenberg tips her hand a bit when I ask her which holiday song she enjoys singing most: “There’s Still My Joy,” a Beth Nielsen Chapman/Melissa Man-chester/Matt Rollings composition, and the seventh track on the Holidays From the Heart album.

“It’s not a big, fashy song; vocally, it’s pretty simple,” Hertzenberg says. “But it requires you to tap into a re-ally honest place. That’s an interesting challenge, par-ticularly when it comes to Christmas music.” – Geoff Carter

KRISTEN HERTZENBERG AND PHILIP FORTENBERRY OPEN THEIR HEART

[ HEAR NOW ]

TRADE VOORHEES DROPS A VIDEOGiven his stage name and song titles such as “Horror Movie Kid,”

it’s obvious where Vegas emcee and producer Trade Voorhees

gets his inspiration. But to classify him as horrorcore would be

a mistake. Sure, he calls himself the “Stephen King of the rap

game,” and says he’s “R.L. Stine with my design,” but it’s far from

gratuitous shock rap. On his new Video EP, Trade gives a warn-

ing to rappers on the brooding, Boogie Nights-referencing “Little

Bill” and gets a little funky with the samples on “Dreamin.” Of

course, there are several references to death, too. Buy that EP at

TradeVoorhees.com.

Check out Zoneil’s other music recommendations at

VegasSeven.com/HearNow and follow him on Twitter @zoneil.

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A&E Rocking Around the Foil Tree

Mining the mid-mod sonic stylings for our annual list of seasonal songs that don’t suck

By Jason Scavone

OF ALL THE CHRISTMAS TRADITIONS— decorating, shopping, spending time with family—my absolute favorite is, without a doubt, getting blasted on eggnog.

My second favorite, though, is comb-ing through the stacks to make a killer Christmas mix. It’s a disease, and I’ve learned to live with it. I’ll be handing out red-and-green awareness ribbons at the corner of the Boulevard and Flamingo later this week.

Close your eyes and picture Christ-mas in Las Vegas. Does it include big-fnned rides cruising down the Strip and kidney-shaped pools behind the ho-tels? Of course it does, because we could no less divest that association between mid-century modern aesthetics and Vegas than the history-loving heroes of the Neon Museum could divest them-selves of La Concha. It’s sort of possible, but you’d be ashamed if they did.

So let’s get conceptual, and lay out a Christmas mix that dodges the obvi-ous Frank and Dean, and gets to the creamy center of weirdo mid-mod goodness. Bust out those Shiny Brite ornaments and hang ’em from your aluminum tree, sister.

“Christmas Party” by Brendan Hanlon & the Bat-Men. The late ’60s might be a stretch here, but this rocker would be the title track if Quentin Tar-antino ever made a Christmas movie. Also, why has Quentin Tarantino never made a Christmas movie? What, is Samuel L. Jackson too good to play a foulmouthed elf leading a bloody rev-olution against Santa? Of course he’s not. He was in The Spirit, for God’s sake.

“Seymour the Beatnik Elf” by Larry Barton and the Freebees. So now let’s backtrack to our temporal wheelhouse. Instead of making toys, Seymour liked to play the bongos. He’s essentially the anti-Hermie. Sure, he might have ended up on the Island of Misft Toys, too, but he would’ve been way too cool to hang out with a Charlie in the Box.

“Big Red and the Cool Yule” by Jim-my Bowman. What’s that? More jazz-bos spitting archaic slang? Well, OK. If you insist. Big Red, in this case, does not refer to gum. Santa delivers albums of rhythm, blues and bop, suggesting San-ta may actually be Thelonious Monk. Have you ever seen Santa and Theloni-ous Monk in the same place at the same

time? Are we sure the naughty and nice list isn’t really the cats and cubes list?

“The Offce Party” by Jim Backus. The skit sorbet of our decadently rich 12-course all-fruitcake meal. If mid-mod were a character doing a thing, it would be Backus’ Thurston Howell III knocking back something that involves eight kinds of rum and a coconut mug. Which explains why Frankie’s Tiki Room has a cocktail named after him.

“Jing-A-Ling-A-Ling” by Wayne King and his Orchestra. How this song hasn’t been deployed by some dreary, tiresome blowhard documentarian in an ironic way to underscore the evils of holiday-themed capitalism, I don’t know. What I do know is I’ll crawl through the Interstellar black hole to get to a ’50s-era mall and shop to this. With a chorus line of girls in Santa suits behind me.

“Space Age Santa Claus” by Patty Marie Jay with the Hal Bradley Or-chestra. And now we get to the heart of it. Santa Claus in a space suit, driv-ing a rocket sled. This song was retro-futuristic fve seconds after it came out and nothing has made me want to join NASA harder in my life. This is the hap-piest thing ever put to wax and makes Pharrell’s cut from last year sound like Joy Division trapped in a pediatric oncology ward. It is defnitive proof that everything has been getting worse since 1961.

“Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer Mambo” by Billy May with Alvin Stoller. Have you ever heard someone describe a song as “boozy” and won-dered what they meant? This is what they meant. The only reason more ’50s cocktail parties didn’t end in more knife fghts was because they had the imported strains of exotica to soothe their gin-soaked nerves.

“Silent Night” by Scott Weiland. The Stone Temple Pilots frontman did an admirable job recapturing the “screw it, just add a bossa nova beat” aesthetic of the era from this cut off his 2011 plat-ter The Most Wonderful Time of the Year. You will not be surprised to learn this is the only decent jam off the album.

“Jingle Bells” by Esquivel! Speak-ing of boozy, Esquivel! was the king of “Space Age bachelor pad” music. He was in the thick of it in the day, but didn’t turn out a Christmas record until 1996. This gem includes lyrics like “Zoo zoo zwee, boink boink, pow.” Esquivel! is possibly the Black Eyed Peas’ spirit animal.

“The Merriest” by June Christy. If you already know anything on this list, it’s probably this one. This song uses your face like a speed bag for relentless optimism. This song is scientifcally proven to cause 50 percent of people to buy random strangers a drink.

“Dominick the Donkey” by Lou Monte. Hailing from an era when WASPs still talked about the Eye-talians, there is no way this song, if it came out now, wouldn’t inspire a hundred insipid self-fagellating think pieces about the nature of anti-Italian prejudice endemic to Christmas mu-sic. We’re the absolute worst.

FINALLY, ACHMED THE DEAD TERRORIST has a Vegas residency. Graciously, he’s invited Jeff Dunham along.

Wait … Dunham’s the headliner?That’s the artistry of a ven-

triloquist who creates puppets that seem like they can stand (and in one case, run) on their own without a hand up their splinter-y asses. That makes Not Playing With a Full Deck, Dunham’s new Planet Hollywood show, a master class of sometimes profane, often sca-brously funny dummy shtick that middle-fingers political correct-ness with both digits. With due respect to talented Terry Fator, it’s hard to imagine another ventrilo-quist turning this retro, mostly marginalized comic form into something more hip and flip.

Opening the production is a taped takeoff on TV’s 24 star-ring Dunham and his cast of knee jockeys: cranky old Walter; purple-faced Peanut; mini-doppelgänger Little Jeff; and Achmed.

Spoofng—with a slight squirm factor—the notion of a terrorist plot against Vegas, it casts Walter as the president, and Achmed, losing his thirst to “keeeel you” when handed an escort-for-hire fier and ogling the poolside parade of female pulchritude. (“The burqas here in Las Vegas are very short.”) Then Dunham warms up his own show with a standup rou-tine built around a funny slide show of his upbringing, family and nerdy passion for voicing puppets.

Once the puppets—or, as Little Jeff says, “Wooden Americans”—arrive, Dunham is a runaway comedy train barreling through jokes that hit the expected topics (marriage, relation-ships, social media) but also needle President Obama, gays, Mexicans, blacks, Jews, Arabs—even hotel co-headliner Britney Spears, to whom he compares himself by quipping: “In both shows, the lip-synching will be slightly off.”

When introducing smart-ass Little Jeff, Dunham yanks off its head and exposes its hollow back to demonstrate how it’s operated. Yes, it’s a puppet, but seeing its guts

can take us out of the mood—and in fact, after it’s reassembled, the audience is slower to rev back up to full-laugh speed. Yet, in a display of his deftness at character creation, Dunham animates L.J. with snippy, hilarious sarcasm, and the laughs immediately bounce back long and loud. Then, in a fabulous sight gag, Dunham chases Little Jeff across

the stage and tackles it.

In fact, poking fun at his craft—and our willing-ness to accept the absurdity of

a grown man making dolls talk—is a running thread, as when he jokes about the strain of the show: “I have to talk through at least half the show.” Or, when Big Jeff feigns a hitch in his throat, Little Jeff says: “E-nun-ciate, asshole.”

Though one segment that briefly incorporates his puppet on a stick, Jose Jalapeño, is fairly weak, the show ends on an Achmed high as the angry/cuddly little terrorist and Dunham answer written audi-ence questions. Whether they’re planned or ad-libbed is secondary. Primary is the laugh:

Question: “If someone touches or smells your hair, is it sexual harassment?”

Achmed: “No. Unless it’s a midget.”To use a comic’s slang for rockin’

the house: Dunham kills. Achmed keeeels.

Got an entertainment tip? Email Steve.Bornfeld@VegasSeven.com.

DUMMY AND

DUMMY-ERVentriloquist

Jef Dunham is the King of Jokers

STAGE

FINALLY, ACHMED THE DEAD TERRORIST has a Vegas residency. Graciously, he’s invited Jeff Dunham along.

the headliner?

triloquist who creates puppets that seem like they can stand (and in one case, run) on their own without a hand up their splinter-y

Not Playing With , Dunham’s new Planet

DUMMY AND

DUMMY-ER

Achmed and

Dunham.

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CHERYL STRAYED’S 2012 MEMOIR WILD HAS become a swift, solidly built movie cap-turing most of its author’s most inter-esting baggage stuff—the weedy tangle of regrets, the reckless bumper-car behavior borne of grief—while offering a rather different experience of what Strayed called “radical aloneness.”

I can’t unread the book, which I love. Therefore I can only offer my feelings about director Jean-Marc Vallée’s flm, a showcase for a pared-down and very fne performance from Reese Wither-spoon, in relation to its source.

In 1995, Strayed left behind her life in Minneapolis, along with her soon-to-be-ex-husband, to embark on a 1,100-mile trek up the Pacifc Crest Trail, from the Mojave Desert to the Columbia River at the Oregon-Washington bor-der. Earlier that year, Strayed adopted her poetic last name over the one she came in with, Nyland. In the summer of ’95—alone, with a massive backpack and too-small hiking boots—she started walking, toward a truer sense of herself.

Her demons joined her on the path. Memories of Strayed’s recently deceased mother (dead of cancer at 45) dogged her. So did her wasted months as a heroin user. Raised with a series

of mostly terrible father fgures in and out of her family’s life, by her 20s Strayed had gotten used to obliterating that life as she was living it.

The Pacifc Crest Trail required of her a kind of spiritual cleansing, if only be-cause its extreme variances in climate (deep snow; hot, hot desert) daunted more experienced hikers than Strayed. She encountered snakes, wild bulls, detours and surprises. Like the book, the flm, photographed with lightweight digital cameras, captures what it’s like to have lingering memories fooding your perception of the present.

As a writer, Strayed did not let herself off the hook. Her account, clear-eyed but with a luminous pull, never fell into drippy Eat, Pray, Love territory of privi-leged self-actualization. Strayed did what she did, and she learned from it.

The flm begins the same way the book does.

Six weeks into her hike, Strayed ac-cidentally knocks one of her boots down a mountainside, and then—enraged—she throws the other one after it. From there, screenwriter Nick Hornby (About a Boy, An Education) fashbacks to Strayed’s childhood in Minnesota, her dropout heroin phase in Portland, Oregon, her limited circumstances in Minneapolis.

Losing her mother (played truly and yearningly by Laura Dern) in her early 20s, Strayed embarks on a series of relational car crashes. Husband Paul (Thomas Sadoski) still loves her, and she loves him, but presented with forks in the road representing the familiar and the unknown, Strayed chooses the latter.

After the marital split, on her perilous hike up the trail, she meets stray hikers and occasional rides to the next town, some gregarious, many threatening.

The signposts of her travels are clear-ly marked onscreen: Day 58 and so on.

When a new, larger pair of boots ar-rives in the mail, picked up at a ranger station, it’s like Christmas times 20.

Witherspoon is such an innate sparkler, you wonder if she’s able to disappear into a character underneath so many protective emotional layers. Calmly yet restlessly, she brings to life Strayed’s longings, her states of grief and desire and her wary optimism.

Screenwriter Hornby respects Strayed’s darting fashback approach. But Hornby’s a quippy sort of fellow, and his wit is a lot snappier, for better or worse, than Strayed’s. Like the Danny Boyle flm version of 127 Hours, Wild is extremely nervous about boring its au-dience with its protagonist’s aloneness.

Still, Witherspoon and Dern are rea-son enough to see it. The star optioned the material and digs deeply.

Wild (R) ★★★✩✩

SHORT REVIEWS By Tribune Media Services

MEMORABLE MEMOIR

Reese Witherspoon takes

you on the hike of your life

By Michael Phillips Tribune Media Services

A&E

Penguins of Madagascar (PG) ★★✩✩✩Charming in small doses, the Penguins of

Madagascar are less irresistible in their

feature-length starring debut. The intent

is to explore the backstory of the penguin

quartet from the previous Madagascar

films. Dr. Octavius Brine (voiced by John

Malkovich) is an octopus disguised as

an eccentric human scientist who hates

penguins. Brine commands an octopus

army with the plan of turning penguins a

into mutants. The jokes may be plentiful,

but they’re rarely inspired.

Foxcatcher (R) ★★★✩✩Director Bennett Miller’s Foxcatcher is a true-

crime drama hailed as a modern classic since

it debuted at the Cannes Film Festival. The

facts are rich. In 1996, on his Foxcatcher Farm

estate, wrestling enthusiast and chemical

company heir John du Pont killed Olympic

gold medalist Dave Schultz. When we first see

Channing Tatum’s Mark, he’s speaking before

students. Steve Carell portrays du Pont, and

it’s a canny performance. Mark Ruffalo as

Dave Schultz plays the script’s one truly happy

man. Foxcatcher grapples with the subjects of

class and money.

Horrible Bosses 2 (R) ★✩✩✩✩This incredibly tasteless sequel is an

excuse to bring back Jason Bateman,

Charlie Day and Jason Sudeikis for

another round of amateur-criminal high

jinks and semi-improvised vulgarity. After

finding a wealthy investor (Christoph

Waltz) to help them manufacture and

distribute their new invention, our heroes

find themselves double-crossed when the

investor reneges on their deal. With no

legal recourse, the three friends kidnap the

investor’s handsome, preening son (Chris

Pine), and demand a ransom.

Panic 5 Bravo (R) ★★✩✩✩This tin-can thriller is set almost entirely

inside a paramedic ambulance under siege,

just below the U.S.-Mexican divide south of

Arizona. Writer-director-star Kuno Becker

plays an Arizona paramedic whose crew

includes a retirement-bound chief (John

Henry Richardson,); the hazed newbie (Dan

Rovzar); and the racist (Aurora Papile), who

will eventually strip down to her bra. Parked

on the U.S. side, the paramedics receive

word of a code 5 Bravo, a shooting, and as

luck would have it, they are yards from the

gunshot victim on the other side.

MOVIESMOVIES

Witherspoon embodiesauthor and intrepid hiker Cheryl Strayed.

Dumb and Dumber To (PG-13) ★★★✩✩Twenty years after they lowered the bar on

dumb character comedies, Lloyd and Harry

are back. Jim Carrey and Jeff Daniels

energetically reprise their popular roles.

Harry needs a kidney donor, so the two

head off in search of the dopey bombshell

(Rachel Melvin) who might be his daughter

and a potential donor match. Comedy left

the Farrelly brothers behind more than 10

years ago, and even their best efforts at

reviving their PG-13 Three Stooges style

feel old-fashioned and tired.

Rosewater (R) ★★★✩✩The Daily Show’s Jon Stewart makes his

first-feature film, and it works. Stewart has

serious talent behind the camera, as well as

a sense of humor. He’s telling his fictionalized

version of the story of Maziar Bahari, a

journalist covering the 2009 elections in

Iran for Newsweek. Shortly after appearing

in a Daily Show segment, the reporter was

arrested and tossed in a Tehran prison. The

excellent prison scenes with Bahari (Gael

Garcia Bernal) and the interrogator/torturer

known to Bahari as Rosewater (Kim Bodnia),

after the cologne he wears, anchor the film.

Beyond The Lights (PG-13) ★★★✩✩Beyond the Lights is another pain-behind-

the-music romance. But it’s so well written,

cast and played that we lose ourselves in it

all. This hip-hop-era Bodyguard has heart

and soul, thanks to stars Gugu Mbatha-

Raw, Minnie Driver and Nate Parker. Rising

hip-hop phenom Noni (Mbatha-Raw) is

dating a star rapper, doesn’t drink and

never loses track of the album that’s about

to drop. Her driven stage mother/manager

(Driver) keeps Noni focused. But Noni is in

misery. Can the cop assigned to guard her

door (Parker) save her?

The Theory of Everything (PG-13) ★★★✩✩You can’t entirely trust this romanticized

portrait of astrophysicist Stephen Hawking

and his first wife, Jane. The film is a story

of a marriage that survives in the face of

crushing disease, and within the framework

of a caretaker scenario that led to Jane’s

depression in the midst of Stephen’s global

fame. As Hawking, Eddie Redmayne has the

most interesting role of his career, and he’s up

to it. In a more recessive role, Felicity Jones

is hints at Jane’s internal struggles even when

the film chooses a more decorous route.

The Hunger Games: Mockingjay, Part 1 (PG-13) ★★★✩✩This is a worthy third movie in the Suzanne

Collins franchise—destined to satisfy

the legions of filmgoers willing to swing

with a lot of scheming and skulking in an

underground bunker in order to get to

the revolution. The third book in Collins’

dystopian-lit juggernaut has been halved.

And it works. Not everything in Mockingjay

is dynamic; director Francis Lawrence

occasionally mistakes somnambulance for

solemnity. The series wraps up with the

release of Mockingjay 2 in November 2015.

The Homesman (R) ★★★✩✩Director, co-writer and star Tommy Lee

Jones’ The Homesman is a film out of

time. It takes place in 1855, the year after

the creation of the Nebraska Territory.

Frustratingly uneven, rarely dull, it comes

from Glendon Swarthout’s 1988 novel and

deals with isolated characters living in the

margins of history far away from the historic

gunfights or the Colorado Rockies. We first

see the virtuous single farm woman Mary

Bee Cuddy behind a two-horse plow, and

when you have Hilary Swank playing this

sort of role, that’s a ton of virtue straight off.

M A R K E T P L A C E

M A R K E T P L A C E

M A R K E T P L A C E

NOW OPENTuesday - Saturday 5pm - Close

On the corner of Ogden and 6th Parking available across the streetDowntown Ages 25+

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M A R K E T P L A C E

THIS IS THE SEASON OF TIMEWORN traditions—you know, like giving to the less fortunate, It’s a Wonderful Life, the Christmas tree in Rockefeller Center, Bing Crosby and Danny Kaye … hip checking old ladies out of the iPad line … human-resources visits after company holiday parties … air-ing grievances with family members (Happy Festivus!).

Not to be outdone, the sports bet-ting community also celebrates a ritual at this time every year: padding the ol’ bankroll by wagering against NFL teams that have thrown in the towel. Let’s take a look at the 2014 class of white-fag wavers:

Jets (2-11): Let me start by address-ing the fact that three of the fve 2-11 teams—the Raiders, Jaguars and Buccaneers—didn’t make this dubious list. Why? Because they’ve actually shown some spunk in recent weeks. It’s the reason I almost didn’t include the Jets, who in their last two games nearly knocked off the Dolphins at home before taking the Vikings to overtime in Minnesota. Then again, when you leave it all on the feld in consecutive late-season games in an otherwise lost season, yet fail in excruciating fashion both times, well … it’s like the prisoner who twice gets one leg over the 20-foot wall, only to be smacked down both times. The good news for the Jets? Their next opponent is …

Titans (2-11): When we look back on the 2014 NFL season, the biggest shocker—aside from Roger Goodell keeping his job—will be Tennessee’s season-opening 26-10 victory over the Chiefs in Kansas City! Since then, the Titans have tasted victory just once—they beat Jacksonville 16-14 at home—and have rewarded bettors just twice. Want proof that Tennes-see has mailed it in? Look at the last three games: 43-24 loss to the Eagles, 45-21 loss to the Texans, 36-7 loss to the Giants. The French have never folded like this.

Redskins (3-10): Washington’s three victims this year: Jacksonville, Tennessee and Dallas. Talk about one of these things not being like the others. Before you consider put-ting a single red cent on a team that benched a former No. 2-overall pick for Colt McCoy, note that seven of the Redskins’ 10 losses have been by double digits, and going back to Week 4, they’re 2-8 against the spread.

Bears (5-8): It’s the equivalent of the chicken-and-egg debate: Did Jay Cutler quit on his team or did

his team quit on Cutler? No matter, Chicago is a mess, having dropped seven of its last 10 games straight-up and ATS—the last two losses being to the Cowboys and Lions by a combined tally of 75-45. Here’s all you need to know about the state of ’Da Bears: They’re a home underdog this week against an opponent (New Orleans) that has the exact same 5-8 record and is coming off a 31-point loss at home!

49ers (7-6): How does a 7-6 team end up on this list? By producing just 248 yards in a 24-13 loss to the Raiders—despite having 10 days to prepare, after an embarrassing 19-3 Thanksgiving night home loss to the hated Seahawks! San Francisco has now scored 17 points or fewer in six of its last seven games, going 2-5 ATS. (Hmm, how’s that Colin Kaepernick contract looking now?) I knew Jim Harbaugh’s act would wear thin even-tually, but this thin?

Clearly, Las Vegas is aware that the Niners have quit on Harbaugh. Even though San Francisco is traditionally one of the betting public’s favor-ite teams, oddsmakers opened the Seahawks (6-1 in their last seven) as a 9½-point favorite in the rematch in Seattle this week. That number quick-ly jumped to 10—and it’s only going higher. Memo to Seattle authorities: When the power goes out late in the third quarter Sunday at CenturyLink Field—nullifying all betting action on this contest—consider launching your investigation in Vegas …

Last Week: 2-5 (1-2 NFL; 1-3 college; 1-0 Best Bet).Season Record: 48-50 (24-27 NFL; 24-23 college; 5-9 Best Bets).

Matt Jacob appears at 10 a.m. Thursdays on Pregame.com’s First Preview on ESPN Radio 1100-AM and 100.9-FM.

BETTING

LUCKY SEVEN

Seahawks -10 vs. 49ers (Best Bet)

Giants -6.5 vs. Redskins

Dolphins +7.5 at Patriots

Bills +5 vs. Packers

Broncos -4 at Chargers

Steelers-Falcons OVER 54

Raiders-Chiefs UNDER 41.5

M A T T J A C O B

THE LOST CAUSESWhat to do when certain NFL teams clearly

quit on the season? Bet against them!

What was your reaction when

you were assigned the O.J.

Simpson armed robbery and

kidnapping case in 2008?

I wasn’t intimidated by it. I wasn’t scared about it. My goal was to treat it as much like any other case as I

could. I was very hands-on with the preparation of ev-erything. I had regular meet-ings with security, court-

house staff, the clerk’s offce and the jail. We tried to plan out everything, and I worked closely with the Court TV folks who were there.

Could you have refused it?

It’s very diffcult for a judge not to take an assignment, because you want the ran-domness. You don’t want judges turning down work; that sets a bad precedent. When there are conficts, you need to be able to articulate why you can’t be able to take a particular case. So, no, I’m not sure I could have turned it down, and I’m not the kind of person who would have turned it down.

What did you learn from

Simpson’s double-murder trial

in California in 1995?

Not losing control of my court-room to the lawyers was the biggest lesson—making sure I was in charge. The lawyers, when they appealed Simp-son’s guilty verdict in Clark County, sent video of me to the Nevada Supreme Court, because [they said] I was just so mean to them. I wasn’t mean; I was in control. … They knew I was that way from the frst time I got assigned that case. I would have the lawyers in to do regular status checks, so that I could keep them on the schedule. I had to continue it once, but I wanted to hold frm to that trial date. So they got to know my personality long before the trial.

You were a television journalist

before you went to law school.

How did that experience help you

deal with the Saturday Night

Live parodies and jokes in Jay

Leno’s monologue?

I laughed. When you’re in-volved in a high-profle case, you’re going to be subject to a lot of things like that, a lot of criticism. You have to put yourself in a bubble and not pay attention and not look at anything anybody is saying about you. So the funny stuff was fne, but I never read the paper, I didn’t read the blogs—I just put myself in my little bubble and kept pressing on.

Was there a point in the trial

when you knew how the jury

was going to go?

Absolutely not. But the evidence was overwhelming. People with whom O.J. sur-rounded himself audiotaped the preparation of this ca-per; the casino had video of them walking in; the casino had video of them walking

out; there was someone who audiotaped the events in the room; there was audiotape of the postmortem (I call it) of the event. The jury’s going to do whatever the jury’s go-ing to do. I can’t and I don’t predict what they’re going to do. In my time as a judge I saw juries do things that I did not expect. That’s just the nature of the system.

At the sentencing, you memorably

asked whether Simpson was

“arrogant, ignorant or both. …

I got the answer, and it was

both.” Did you plan to say that?

As a reporter, I was always challenged to come up with a sound bite, and it used to aggravate me when judges or public offcials would just go on and on. So I always tried to come up with a sound bite. I think it was organic. I thought about some things, and it just happened naturally—but it was perfect! It captured him perfectly. It kinda exploded after that. … I got crazy let-ters. I got people who hated me, people who loved me. I still have people who hug me, and who want to shake my hand and thank me. It’s still going on.

What was your takeaway

from working for one season

on Swift Justice?

Because I was off the bench, when the position of district attorney became available, my husband [former Las Vegas Councilman Steve Wolfson] was able to apply. If I had been on the bench, it would have been a lot more diffcult [for him] because I did so much criminal work, particularly in the specialty courts. I don’t know if it would have been able to hap-pen. It was very fortuitous. Life has a very interesting way of working out.

What was the best excuse you

heard to get out of jury duty?

Oh, my God! That was one of my biggest pet peeves. … I didn’t tolerate excuses very well, but there was a man who said he was psychic. He told us he knew he was go-ing to get off [the jury], and I think I had to leave the bench because I was going to laugh out loud. The whole place erupted, and it was during a serious murder trial. His pre-diction came true.

When does Glass think O.J.

Simpson will get out of

prison? Read the full interview at

VegasSeven.com/Glass.86

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Jackie GlassThe retired district court judge on the O.J. Simpson trial,

the challenge of celebrity and why the timing of her

term on Swif Justice was fortuitous.

By Paul Szydelko