This week, Ira Sternberg spoke with Oscar Goodman.
Oscar Goodman, one of America's most celebrated criminal defense attorneys and former three-term mayor of Las Vegas, tells his story in a new memoir, “ Being Oscar: From Mob Lawyer to Mayor of Las Vegas, Only in America (Weinstein Books).”
Known as the "mob’s lawyer” for more than three decades, Oscar Goodman was the go-to defense attorney for some of the biggest gangsters in America. Written with co-author George Anastasia, “Being Oscar” reveals never-before-disclosed details of his service to a Who's Who of mob bosses such as Meyer Lanksy, Anthony "Tony the Ant" Spilotro, Nick Civella, Vinny "The Animal" Ferrara and "Crazy" Phil Leonetti.
Being Oscar takes the reader on a tour through organized crime's inner sanctum and into the courtroom, where Oscar argued cases about government wiretapping, an impeachment of a federal judge before the United States Senate, a drug dealer charged with assassinating a federal judge, and the infamous "Black Book," an exclusion list that banned targeted individuals from entry into the Las Vegas casinos.
“Being Oscar” also chronicles his three-term run as the flamboyant and controversial mayor of Las Vegas.