L.A. Noir: The Struggle for the Soul of America's Most Seductive City

Popularity and a measure of power seemed to have boosted Parker’s confidence—if not his cockiness. Soon after taking over, Parker took Sullivan and John Dick, a fire department captain, along on a lobbying trip to Sacramento. When the state legislature adjourned for the weekend without taking action on the item they had come to lobby legislators about, Parker proposed that they stay on. The men readily agreed, and the group set off for the Fairmont Hotel. There Parker demanded—and received—a suite. The men then went down to the bar, where Parker boldly struck up a conversation with “two very attractive young ladies” and a fellow who seemed to be their chaperone. The bar closed down at midnight, but Parker wasn’t ready to end the evening.

“So what are you doing next?” Parker asked.

The ladies’ group mentioned that they were going to an after-hours joint in another part of town. Parker asked if his group could join them. The women and their male companion readily agreed to this, so off everyone went. At the end of the evening, Parker went home with one of the women, perhaps, said Sullivan dryly, “to give her a lecture on prostitution.”

This was the new Bill Parker, assertive, entitled, and worldly. And still only partially reconciled with his wife, Helen.

      IN THE SPRING of 1947, Parker’s newfound confidence was on display for all to see when he served as the toastmaster for the Protective League’s annual civic dinner. It was the largest dinner in the league’s history. Mayor Bowron was the guest of honor. By all accounts, Parker delivered a sparkling performance. That summer, Parker again garnered headlines when the French government awarded him the Croix de Guerre with Silver Star for his service during the war. At the end of the month, when the LAPD released its promotions-eligibility list, Parker topped the list of those eligible for promotion to inspector. He moved up in the legion, becoming, first, vice commander of Post 381 and then commander. Under Parker’s direction, membership exploded, growing to 1,400 in 1947 (the largest annual increase of any post in the state). The next year, it topped the 2,000-person mark. In recognition, he was made membership chairman of the statewide legion.

There was just one thing that hadn’t changed—the underworld. If anything, its tentacles were as tightly entwined around the city as they had been in the mid-1930s. And Parker was surprised to discover it had a new leader: Mickey Cohen.

11 The Sporting Life

“[T]o be honest with you, his getting knocked in was not a bad break for me….”

—Mickey Cohen

MICKEY’S RISE wasn’t always easy. There always seemed to be someone around who wanted to crash the party.

First, there were the uninvited guests, guys like Benny “the Meatball” Gamson from Chicago. Moody and arrogant, “the Meatball” inspired little personal affection among those who came to know him. But he had fast hands and a substantial reputation as a “mechanic,” a crooked card dealer, which meant that he was much sought after by flat shops and juice joints across town. He’d frequently worked with Mickey during the days when Cohen had run wildcat casinos and card games in the Loop and on the North Shore. “The Meatball” added so much to the house advantage that Mickey had even given Gamson “a piece of the operation.” In Gamson’s mind, that made Mickey and him partners. So when Gamson suddenly appeared in Southern California as the war was winding down, he naturally looked Mickey up and proposed reestablishing their old relationship.

But Mickey had changed. Back in Chicago, Mickey had been little more than a punk kid with only a dim awareness of who “the people” were. Since returning to Los Angeles, he had become one of “the people” himself. In Mickey’s mind, “the Meatball” simply didn’t have “the get-up … the class, would be the only word that I could possibly find” to associate with the likes of, well, himself. So when Gamson asked Cohen to “move him in closer” with Siegel, Dragna, and Roselli, Cohen had to tell him that he couldn’t do it. None of those worthies would meet with a pisher like Gamson.

Mickey tried to be nice about it, but the nicer he acted, the angrier Gamson got. Finally, Gamson told his former partner that if Siegel and Dragna wouldn’t deal with him, he, Gamson, would just bring in his own crew, starting with Georgie Levinson, a noted Chicago tough. Cohen “tried to reason with him and make him understand” that that wasn’t a very good idea.

“I told him, ‘Lookit Ben, if we can help in [some other] way—’,” but such offers only made “the Meatball” madder. To put an exclamation point on his pique, Gamson roughed up one of Mickey’s old friends from Boyle Heights. Then Gamson linked up with a rival bookie named Pauley Gibbons. This would not do. It was time to hit back.