FBI 'Top Hoodlum Coverage' summary on Meyer Lansky: Havana gambling and the Tropicana Night Club (14 September 1955)
An FBI intelligence summary says information from the Bureau representative in Cuba was that Meyer and Jake Lansky were trying to set up a gambling operation in Havana, and that agents saw Meyer Lansky with Dino Cellini, credit manager at the Tropicana Night Club's gambling concession. Part is redacted.
- Date
- 1955-09-14
- Kind
- case-file
- Source
- FBI Records: The Vault
- Retrieved
- 2026-10-12
- Rights
- A record of the Federal Bureau of Investigation released under FOIA. A work of the United States government, public domain under 17 U.S.C. § 105.
Viewer page 64 of Part 01 is a “General Investigative Intelligence File” summary headed “Top Hoodlum Coverage” and dated 14 September 1955, stamped with the serial 62-97928-15 and a 1964 “copies destroyed” stamp. It lists Lansky’s aliases as printed (Meyer the Bug, Bugsy Meyer, Little Meyer, Little Myer, Meyer Lazansky, Morris Lieberman) and his FBI number, 791783.
The summary says Lansky was not very active, that the Immigration and Naturalization Service was trying to deport him, and that “Information has been received from the Bureau representative in Cuba to the effect that MEYER LANSKY and his brother, JAKE, were attempting to set up a gambling operation in Havana, Cuba.” The combination “was reputedly consisting of the two LANSKYS, DANDY PHIL KASTEL, and a group from Las Vegas, Nevada.” After a redacted passage it says “Agents of the Havana Office observed MEYER LANSKY in the company of DINO CELLINI, American credit manager at the gambling concession in the Tropicana Night Club in Havana, Cuba.”
The page is an intelligence summary of reported information, not an adjudicated finding. The text was read from the page image stored here.
