Akio Kashiwagi was a crafty soul. He wheeled and dealed for rebates and credit on a scale available only to those willing to risk millions of dollars on each trek to the tables. He also seemed to have all sorts of side deals going with casino hosts, like cashing in chips obtained on credit, which turned the paper risk of a marker into real exposure for the casino because the gambler had obtained hard dollars. And he tried to buy chips with instruments that some casinos found were not readily convertible into cash, ones that could only be cashed at a particular bank and only if Kashiwagi was standing there. Still, every casino executive worth his comping privileges wanted Kashiwagi, wanted to bag his wallet and have as their own trophy a story of how they had faced, and bested, the world's most fearless gambler. They wanted to tell stories like Dennis Gomes's favorite tale.
Gomes was a straight-laced regulator with an extraordinary reputation among others in law enforcement and among reporters, to whom he leaked some of the best crime stories to come out of Las Vegas. He came to New Jersey before it started casino gambling to show how regulation could be done. But his precise, unannounced raid on Resorts' Bahamas operation, which turned up file drawers full of evidence tying Resorts to Meyer Lansky's gang, and his insistence on following the letter of the law were rewarded by orders chaining him to his desk. Gomes quit and returned to Nevada, where he eventually ran the Dunes, which he leased from its Japanese owner. Gomes had most of his money, a million dollars, sunk in the Dunes, a broken-down excuse for a casino located on the incredibly valuable fourth corner where Caesars Palace, the Barbary Coast and Bally's Grand meet on the Strip. One week he lured Akio Kashiwagi to his table. For hours Gomes watched the play from his television monitor in his office, sweating as Kashiwagi's bankroll grew and grew by one hundred thousand dollars per bet.
When Kashiwagi was $5 million ahead he got up, stretched, and announced it was time to return to Kashiwagi Palace, his $80 million home near the foot of Mount Fuji, the home Japanese tourists kept mistaking for a temple because it was built with huge Japanese cypress logs common to Shinto shrines.
If Kashiwagi left the Dunes would close, because the cash he would demand would wipe the place out. Even if Gomes had the slot machines emptied of their winnings, the Dunes might not be able to cover all its outstanding bills. No matter what, Gomes told his Asian marketing guy, don't let that guy get away.
When the limo brought Kashiwagi and his host to the private jet at McCarran Airport, the pilot came back to say that he felt unlucky and did not want to fly.
"You're just trying to get me to come back so I'll lose," Kashiwagi replied to his host in Japanese.
"Well, you can fly, but I'm not going to die," the host said, heading for the door.
That did it. Kashiwagi said he would fly commercial. Inside the terminal he was taken to the Delta gate and told that the only remaining flight to Los Angeles would arrive too late for him to connect to the plane for Japan. That was sort of true. It was the last Delta flight that night. Kashiwagi, who did not read English, did not ask about other airlines.
The host recommended that Kashiwagi return to the Dunes and fly out the next morning.
"No, you're just trying to get me back to gamble," Kashiwagi said. "Go to Los Angeles and it's going to cost you two thousand dollars
for rooms and food for you and your companions," the host told Kashiwagi, knowing he was a tightwad when it came to expenses. That did it. Kashiwagi agreed to stay the night at the Dunes for free.
On the short limousine ride back the host suggested they have dinner together and then go see one of Norbert Alemain's naked girl revues. They shared a bottle of wine at dinner, but it was empty long before the late show would start so the host suggested that Kashiwagi gamble to fill the time.
"No," Kashiwagi said, "you just want me to lose my money." "Not at all," the host said. "Just bet ten thousand dollars." Kashiwagi sat down, put out ten thousand dollars and won. Gomes knew he had him. "He was thinking that he had shorted himself ninety thousand dollars because if he had bet his usual hundred thousand dollars that's how much more he would have won."
On the next hand Kashiwagi bet $100,000 and he stayed for hours chasing that $90,000. By dawn he had lost the $5 million cash and had signed markers for $5 million more. Gomes not only escaped ruin, he was a multimillionaire, even after giving Kashiwagi a 30 percent discount on his marker.
Stories like this abounded about Kashiwagi, stories about how he had broken or made careers, how he had negotiated for credit and discounts, how he wanted the best suites and then ate bacon, lettuce and tomato sandwiches. How he made deals governing how long he would play in return for credit and broke them. How he would quit when he was ahead. Stories about where he got all that money.
Kashiwagi appeared to have limitless wealth and yet he was not among the top thirty taxpayers in his prefecture. His Tokyo office was modest, with an apartment upstairs, though luxury cars filled the parking spaces out front. A business research firm showed that Kashiwagi's company had just five employees and sales of $15 million, yet Kashiwagi told casino executives he was a billionaire with an income of $100 million a year. Gomes and other casino executives figured he was a sarakin, a Japanese loan shark, with connections to the yakuza, the Japanese mob. That Kashiwagi was said to be part Korean, a serious detriment to business success in Japan, added to these suspicions.
David Johnston "Temples of Chance" 1994
