Coin Slot Magazine - #056 - 1979 - October [International Arcade Museum]
Jahnsen and Warren Olney) for conferences with
charge that the ships were located within the state's
Mayor
jurisdiction.
Chief
Bowron,
District Attorney
Fitts,
L.
A.
of Police Arthur C. Hohman, and L. A.
County Sheriff Biscailuz, to plan a course of action
to close the ships.
When reporters asked how he
was going to accomplish this, Warren replied "We
will find ways and means."
Judge Emmett H. Wilson ruled that "the waters
off Santa Monica, between Point Dume and Point
Vicente constitute a bay, and the state's jurisdic
tion extends three miles to sea from a straight
line drawn
Warren directed his efforts against the REX,
which he considered the fleet's flagship.
He had
collected evidence of alleged fixed games, fights,
beatings, threats, and other wild goings on aboard
bling ships.
But this was not sufficient grounds
to put them out of business.
has a similar configuration.
Warren sent Oscar Jahnsen out to the REX to
his operation.
Jahnsen, accompanied by his wife
and two schoolteacher friends went out to the
REX, had a nice dinner, and began gambling. Jahn
sen was recognized by a lookout who informed
Cornero.
Tony remembered his old adversary of
the Sunset and Fairfax Shootout and came over
for a friendly reunion.
He took Jahnsen and his
guests on a complete tour of the ship and let him
take detailed notes.
"He was particularly proud
Thus to be outside
This ruling enabled Warren to obtain abatement
orders for all four gambling ships. They were sim
ultaneously served Friday night, July 28, 1939.
of eight officers boarded the
REX at
7:45 PM to serve the five-page abatement order.
The squad was headed by Captain George Con-
treras of the sheriff's vice squad and included Santa
Monica Chief of Police Charles L. Dice. The abate
ment order was served to W. J. Stanley, the REX's
captain, and Frank S. Grange, trustee of the ship
(as Cornero was vacationing in Texas at the time),
on the lower deck near the bingo tables.
The
players continued undisturbed but were excited
by a flashbulb picture snapped by one of the
officers.
Grange declared that the abatement order would
of his ship-to-shore phone, and at one point he
opened up a desk drawer and let me see a big
This
about 10 miles out tosea,.an impractical location.
A total
try to talk Cornero into voluntarily closing down
the two headlands."
the state's jurisdiction the ships would have to be
the REX, as well as rumors that money from the
Al Capone crowd in Chicago was behind the gam
between
also applied to the shoreline of Long Beach which
be ignored, and gave a previously arranged state
Jahnsen
ment for such a situation, saying that "The higher
relayed Warren's message that Cornero could have
courts of the State have upheld the legality of
a safe escort across California into Nevada for all
our operations. ...We have never willfully or know
.41
Colt" Jahnsen
later told Warren.
of his gambling equipment; otherwise Warren would
put the ship out of business and destroy the gam-
ling equipment.
Tony wasn't interested, replying
"I'm beyond the three-mile limit. You can't touch
me."
ingly broken the law at any time.
...We intend
to
time as the
continue
operating...until
such
court might rule against us."
As the officers left the REX, the 800 customers
on board continued gambling as usual. Abatement
Warren was infuriated by Cornero's statements.
"It makes no difference if they are three miles or
thirty miles off-shore.
If they constitute a nui
orders were also served to the water taxi operators
at Santa Monica Municipal Pier (but not to the
Long Beach water taxis).
The serving of abate
sance, we have a right to abate it," Warren said.
He based this statement on a old Supreme Court
ment orders to the other ships met with similar
ruling which could be interpreted as giving a state
treated to dinner as guests of the management.
results, except that the TANGO serving party was
the right to halt a nuisance inflicted upon it from
Warren warned that if the ships do not volun
.com go out of business within 48 hours after
tarily
m
:
u
m and u thus
se receiving the abatement notices, he will "crack
fro utility
that the water taxis were a public
m
d
-
e
e
required licenses which o
they
ad didn't rc have;
ad Cornero's down" on them "regardless of what action is taken
nl illegally
a installed;
in Congress or elsewhere." (A bill to outlaw gamb
.
ship-to-shore phone
was
and that
w
o
w
D
w
w
ling ships had been introduced recently in the
although the REX was
anchored over three miles
/
/
:
tp
House of Representatives.)
out, it was still ht within the waters of a bay over
outside territorial limits.
This was one of his legal
weapons to close down the ships.
which California claimed jurisdiction.
Others were
Warren was
aware that his case was weak and unproven in the
To be continued in the November Issue of Coin
courts.
Slot.
He felt he had his best chances with the
© The International Arcade Museum
http://www.arcade-museum.com/