Mafia associates had ties to 5 casinos // When Minnesota Indian tribes launched their casinos, they needed capital and know-how. Mob-linked sources had access to both. And the potential for profits was huge.: [METRO Edition]

Copyright 1994 Star Tribune

Companies and individuals with links to East Coast Mafia families have made millions of dollars doing business with five northern Minnesota casinos.

A company connected to four of those casinos had ties through key personnel to what has been one of the toughest mob organizations in the United States - the New England family headed by Raymond Patriarca Jr. Another casino has had ties with associates of Philadelphia's Bruno/Scarfo gang.

Among findings derived from public records and interviews:

- Patriarca's accountant and onetime middleman set up the books, did tax returns and helped handle a multimillion-dollar sale of a Coon Rapids firm, Creative Games Technology. It supplied slot machines and marketing services to four casinos on the Bois Forte, Leech Lake and Grand Portage Chippewa reservations.

- A man who Patriarca said helps run his personal family's vending and real estate business, and who established the Patriarca family trusts, also performed accounting work for Creative Games.

- A New England racketeer and mob banker, now in prison for embezzlement, was part-owner of Creative Games, as was a man whose family had close ties to Patriarca.

- Though the principals of Creative Games were forced out by state officials last year after a lengthy investigation into the mob links, many employees and the man who ran it are involved in a successor company that is still involved in Minnesota gaming. State investigators say its activities are now outside their authority, but the Star Tribune has learned that it remains a subject of federal investigators.

- The White Earth Chippewa reservation, which now owns Shooting Star Casino, used slot machines - at the time illegal in the state - made by a New Jersey associate of Philadelphia's Bruno/Scarfo mob family. At one point, tribal officials negotiated with that mob associate for a $5 million investment in that casino. The plan called for him to manage the casino once it was built. That deal fell through and he was later indicted, along with the top figures of the Scarfo group, for illegal gaming in New Jersey and Pennsylvania.

- Finally, the man who runs Shooting Star today has faced a separate investigation for a noncasino business relationship in which he dealt - unknowingly, he...