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He's the man who gave Donald Trump his first break in Atlantic City. He organized a Connecticut Indian tribe most people thought was extinct and founded the Foxwoods casino in 1992, only to be banished from the reservation five years later. A former mob prosecutor, he found himself the target of the U.S. Attorney's office when he opened a gambling ship sailing out of Brooklyn.
He's G. Michael "Mickey" Brown and, someday soon, he may be coming to a casino near you.
In an Aug. 21 article, The Wall Street Journal reported that Brown and his financial backer -- a shadowy Chinese-born billionaire named Lim Goh Tong -- are "widely believed to have the inside track" with the Seneca Indians to develop casinos in Niagara Falls and Buffalo, under the agreement hammered out between the tribe and Gov. George Pataki.
Landing a contract with the Senecas would be a high point in Brown's career, which has had more ups and downs than Coney Island's famed Cyclone roller coaster.
Born in 1943 in the working class town of East Orange, N.J., Brown attended private Catholic schools through college. After graduating Seton Hall Law School in 1967, he enlisted in the New Jersey National Guard. For many, enlisting in the Guard was a successful ploy to avoid service in Vietnam, but Brown wasn't so lucky. His unit was called up and sent overseas at the height of the war in 1969.
A corporal, Brown was assigned duty as a truck driver. But after telling an officer in Long Binh that he was a lawyer, Brown was assigned to the Judge Advocate's office and spent his tour of duty as both a prosecutor and defense attorney for the military.
Discharged in 1970, he took a job with the Essex Co., N.J., prosecutor's office and, a year later, became an assistant state attorney general, working with the F.B.I. and state police on organized crime and political corruption cases. His biggest case came in 1980, when he prosecuted Ruggerio Boiardo, reputed head of the Genovese crime family in New Jersey, and nine others. Boiardo walked, but Brown won convictions against four lesser mobsters in what was called "the biggest organized crime investigation in New Jersey history."
Following the Boiardo prosecution, Brown was named head of the newly-formed state Division of Gaming Enforcement. Brown successfully denied gaming licenses to executives of Resorts International, Caesar's World Inc., Bally Mfg., and even Playboy founder Hugh Hefner, on the grounds that they had ties with organized crime. But when Donald Trump came before Brown in 1982, he was granted a license in six months, far less than the one-to-two years applicants were normally made to wait.
When Brown opened his own law office in Atlantic City after leaving the gaming division, Trump became a client, as did the Hilton Hotel chain, the British Gaming Board and the Bahamanian Gaming Board. Another client was Lim Goh Tong, a Chinese national and chairman of Genting Berhad, a Malaysian-based company traded on the Hong Kong and Singapore stock exchanges. One of the richest men in the world, Lim owns casinos in Europe, Malaysia and Australia, as well as a shipping line, a construction company, a bank and other property.
Brown, who served on the board of directors of one of Lim's subsidiary companies, approached the billionaire with a plan to build a casino on the tiny Eastern Pequot reservation in Connecticut. Lim loaned the Indians $60 million on the condition that Brown and another former government lawyer from New Jersey, Al Luciani, run the casino.
Foxwoods opened on Valentine's Day, 1992. The money came rolling in but, along with it, came trouble. Members of the tribe began to complain about the small monthly stipends they were receiving from the casino, which was raking in more than a million dollars a day. Some, including members of the tribal council, began openly questioning the honesty of the Foxwoods executives.
Just eight months after the casino opened, on Oct. 17, 1992, Luciani resigned as Foxwoods CEO in the face of a widening probe. Lim, as the financial backer, had the authority to name Luciani's successor. He tapped Brown, who had been serving as the head of the casino's gaming board.
Pequot Vice Chairman Kenneth Reels made no secret of the fact that he thought as little of Brown as he had of Luciani. The tribal council hired an internal auditor, Deno Marino, to look into allegations of double billing contractors working at Foxwoods and other financial improprieties.
In 1995, the Connecticut State Police launched an investigation of their own and, on Dec. 3 of that year, state police Det. Richard Perron, Pequot Tribal Policeman Michael Wilson and a locksmith named Norman Vitale entered the casino's financial records room.
Brown was livid. The lawmen later said they were acting on reports that documents were being shredded, but Brown used his position as Foxwoods CEO and his friendship with high-ranking Connecticut officials to bring pressure to bear on both the state and tribal police as well as the internal auditor, Deno Marino.
Following investigations by both the state police internal affairs division and the state attorney's office, Det. Perron and his commander, Bradley Beecher, were officially cleared of any wrongdoing in March, 1996. Brown claimed he was being set up.
Weeks later, Marino resigned under pressure from Brown for having cooperated with the state police. Brown appeared to have won the battle, but he would ultimately lose the war. And it would be a simple stock transaction that would prove to be his undoing.
On June 19, 1997, Brown was called before the tribal council to answer to charges of conflict of interest in an alleged insider trading scheme involving a company called IWERKS Entertainment Inc.
Brown bought stock in the company, which manufactures and markets virtual reality entertainment experiences, during its initial public offering. Later, Foxwoods contracted with IWERKS to develop an entertainment center on the Pequot reservation. The value of the stock went up and Brown sold, making a tidy profit.
Again, Brown told tribal leaders he was being set up. But rather than answer the charges, he resigned the next day.
The Pequots' Standard & Poor's bond rating, which had been listed as A just a few years earlier, had been reduced to BBB by the time of Brown's departure. And, although Foxwoods was bringing in more than $1 billion a year, the tribe was $1 billion in debt and had to borrow money to make ends meet.
According to The Wall Street Journal, Brown's partner in the Foxwoods deal, Lim Goh Tong, still receives 9.9 percent of the casino's adjusted gross revenue, plus interest payments on his original loan, under an agreement that will last until 2016.
Grateful for the sweetheart deal, Lim bankrolled Brown's next venture, Manhattan Cruises, a floating, Brooklyn-based casino that ferried gamblers out past the three-mile limit and let them lose to their hearts content.
The U.S. Attorney's office in New York took a dim view of the operation, however, arguing in court that the possession of slot machines was illegal in New York and, furthermore, that the legal limit was actually 12 miles, not three.
Brown began seeking greener pastures and, late in 1998, turned up on the Seneca reservation. Announcing a partnership with then-Seneca President Duane "Jimmy" Ray, Delaware North and Niagara Falls Redevelopment, Brown publicly vowed to have a Seneca casino up and running in Niagara Falls by Memorial Day, 1999. But the plan came to naught.
This summer, following Gov. Pataki's announcement of an agreement with the Senecas, Brown returned to the Niagara Frontier with his longtime partner Lim. Clearly, the two are hoping for a financial windfall similar to that derived from their association with the Pequots.
The question is whether the Senecas are prepared to take the gamble.