It Didn’t Stay Here: Jail for embezzling Scot who partied in Las Vegas

Posted on by February 23, 2018
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It Didn't Stay Here

Las Vegas Strip (by Stefan Wagener via Wikipedia)

Alicia Moran probably looked like just another happy international traveler as she partied along the Las Vegas Strip in 2015. But the Scottish woman had a wee bit of a problem. She was spending money she had embezzled from Thomas Cook, the giant European travel agency where she worked as a foreign exchange sales assistant.

Indeed, it was while she was living it up in Sin City that U.K. authorities back home made the decision to charge her. Moran was arrested at Glasgow Airport returning from her 10-day trip to the colonies–Vegas and New York. A mother of two, she is now in a Scottish jail serving an 18-month sentence that started last month after admitting she stole about $200,000 in just a six-month period.

Moran, 34, becomes the newest person nominated to my list, It Didn’t Stay Here. The roster consists of folks in trouble elsewhere for something that happened in that bug light of mischief called Las Vegas. My list is a pointed refutation of “What Happens Here, Stays Here,” the famous marketing slogan of the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority. You can see previous nominees elsewhere on this New To Las Vegas page. After the terrible October 1 massacre at an outdoor concert on the Strip, the agency stopped advertising the seemingly powerful pitch but resumed its use last month.

And so do I. Continue reading →

Las Vegas news media scene remains weak

Posted on by April 16, 2018
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Las Vegas news mediaSee update at end of story

I’ll give the Las Vegas Review-Journal credit for a big mea culpa. On Monday, it published a stunning story essentially admitting that 20 years ago it deep-sixed a story written by its court reporter that casino tycoon Steve Wynn faced allegations from employees of sex misconduct. The paper protected Wynn even though the 1998 claims were public record at the courthouse for anyone to see and thus immune from a valid defamation lawsuit by Wynn. On Tuesday, thanks to that coverage, which followed a blockbuster expose last month by The Wall Street Journal about many other alleged incidents of sexual misconduct by Wynn, he resigned his CEO and chairman posts at Wynn Resorts, all the while professing his complete innocence.

But who knows how many women could have escaped Wynn’s purported clutches had the Review-Journal properly done its job in 1998, or even at any point before this week? The reporter who dug up that story, and who kept her notes, is still on the paper; she’s an editor now. There also have been corporate ownership changes. But it still took the Review-Journal 10 days after the big Wall Street Journal scoop and months after the birth of the #MeToo movement to summon up the strength to do the right thing.

And it underscores what I have observed since becoming New To Las Vegas in 2016: The Las Vegas news media remains pretty weak when it comes to covering the news. A mile wide and a quarter-inch deep. From what I understand, this has been a problem in Las Vegas for a looooong time.

Indeed, perhaps the most remarkable aspect of the Review-Journal story about Wynn is the admission by then-publisher Sherman Frederick that he doesn’t remember killing the story about the Strip’s most prominent figure. To me, this suggests the paper routinely axed so many valid stories about important folks that this was journalistic business as usual in Las Vegas. Continue reading →

Las Vegas dog on dog crime rate may mirror humans

Posted on by April 17, 2021
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See update at end of story

Las Vegas dog on dog crime

Dog Fancier’s Park, Las Vegas

For all of its appeal to tourists, the Las Vegas area has a big problem. The serious crime rate is very high. The latest official FBI crime statistics, which can lag by up to two years, puts it at 849 incidents for every 100,000 residents. The national average is 373, so the Las Vegas rate is more than double.

Homicides are one component of serious crime (others include rape, robbery and aggravated assault). In 2017, the Las Vegas area had 199 homicides. That includes the 58 persons killed in the October 1 massacre along the Las Vegas Strip. By my rough reckoning, that works out to a local homicide rate of 10.0 for every 100,000 residents. The latest national average is 5.3, so the murder rate is almost double.

So far, this is all about humans. But I’m here to write about murders among dogs. Dog on dog crime, to be specific. At Dog Fancier’s Park, the off-leash dog park in East Las Vegas I visit regularly with my New To Las Vegas Basset Hound, I’m aware of at least two dogs in recent months who were murdered–yes, killed–by other dogs. Owners of victim and perp supposedly were nearby. Continue reading →

Las Vegas folks treated poorly by government

Posted on by December 27, 2017
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Las Vegas folks treated poorlyIt happened again. A lengthy article in the Las Vegas Review-Journal tells how the state government of Nevada has long failed to enforce its own law requiring review of emergency response plans filed by big places like casino hotels. This is no small matter especially given the October 1 massacre by a gunman firing from the Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino across the Strip to an outdoor performance venue that killed 58 and wounded more than 500 (just voted the year’s biggest crime story by CNN).

Earlier this year, I wrote a long piece for The Nevada Independent about how the state Secretary of State’s Office doesn’t comply with a 2013 state law requiring that full financial statements or IRS Form 990s be posted on its website of charities soliciting for contributions in the state. This makes it a lot easier for sketchy charities that spend as much as 90% of the money raised on fundraising and overhead to hide their scandalous financial efficiencies from my now-fellow Nevadans.

Several state officials, including Republicans Gov. Brian Sandoval and Attorney General Adam Laxalt (who is campaigning to replace Sandoval when his term ends next year), have refused to enforce a law calling for background checks on private-party gun sales that was actually passed statewide by voters in 2016. They say the law is flawed.

As someone still New To Las Vegas, I find only one conclusion to draw from this and other governmental actions–or inactions. Nevada is a state whose governmental entities and agencies do not take very good care of its citizens. Continue reading →

Pitch from dodgy cancer charity graces holiday time in Las Vegas

Posted on by April 17, 2021
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dodgy cancer charity Holiday season. The time of giving. The phone rang at the New To Las Vegas world headquarters. Molly–or rather, an interactive computer programmed to say it was Molly–was on the line. After telling a lame joke, she/it cut to the chase. She/it said she/it was soliciting donations to the Women’s Cancer Fund, and hoped I could be counted to make a financial pledge.

I had not heard of the Women’s Cancer Fund (not all that surprising since there are thousands of charities in the country with the word “cancer” in their names). Where is Women’s Cancer Fund located, I asked. “Harrisburg, Pa,” she/it replied cheerily.

I asked for the organization’s federal tax ID number. “You know, I don’t have that,” she/it said, adding that her/its supervisor could help. Indeed, a real live human–who likely was monitoring the back and forth between “Molly” and me–quickly came on the line and gave me a nine-digit number.

Except that after looking it up online, I discovered the number wasn’t in the name of Women’s Center Fund. It was in the name of something called Cancer Recovery Foundation International. Women’s Cancer Fund is one of several cancer-themed trade names that CRFI uses as it asks an unsuspecting public for funds. Other d/b/a’s include Nevada Cancer Research Fund and Pink Diamond Women’s Cancer Fund.

And do I mean unsuspecting. In its latest fiscal period, according to my reckoning, only a sliver of the cash donations CRFI received went directly for anything that I would call good works. The rest was spent on fundraising, marketing and overhead. CRFI does business with several sketchy outfits–several of which I have written about–while using an accounting ploy to make its financial efficiencies and largess seem better than they really are. Continue reading →

Around Las Vegas, Veterans of America is elusive

Posted on by November 17, 2017
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Veterans of AmericaIn the past week or so I’ve received several calls at the New To Las Vegas world headquarters asking if I would like to donate my car–or real estate or even time share–to an outfit called Veterans of America and take a tax deduction. The calls consisted of a tape-recorded message inviting me to either call an 800 number or hit a button on my phone to speak with someone.

Since I never had heard of that organization, I did call or hit the button, several times. But when I asked whoever came on the line for the specific office address or the tax ID number–which would be needed for a valid tax deduction–that person abruptly hung up.

A legitimate nonprofit concerned about its reputation likely would not do that. Continue reading →