Storming Las Vegas: How a Cuban-Born, Soviet-Trained Commando Took Down the Strip to the Tune of Five World-Class Hotels, Three Armored Cars, and Millions of Dollars
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Manufacturer: Ballantine Books
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Average Customer Rating:  
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Binding: Hardcover
Dewey Decimal Number: 364.1552092
EAN: 9780345487452
ISBN: 0345487451
Label: Ballantine Books
Manufacturer: Ballantine Books
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 384
Publication Date: 2008-02-19
Publisher: Ballantine Books
Release Date: 2008-02-19
Studio: Ballantine Books
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Editorial Reviews:
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“In my world, you are either the hunter or the prey, and I am the hunter. Vegas was my prey. I tell my crew: Vegas makes it, Vigoa takes it.”
–Jose Vigoa[pg. 37]
When it comes to violent crime, the Las Vegas cops and casino owners thought they had seen it all. But they had never witnessed anything like Jose Vigoa.
Born in Cuba, a child of Fidel Castro’s revolution, Vigoa used his quick wits and quicker fists to trade a life of poverty and desperation for one of danger and adventure as a Soviet-trained special forces officer. Battle hardened in the killing fields of Afghanistan and Angola, Vigoa won a reputation for toughness, bravery, and coolness under fire. A brilliant military career lay ahead of him.
Then, in 1980, Castro opened Cuba’s floodgates in the Mariel boatlift, and Vigoa, like so many of his countrymen and -women, braved chaos and hardship to start a new life in America’s promised land. But involvement with the drug trade brought his dreams crashing down. Years of prison followed.
On his release, Vigoa was determined to take revenge on what he perceived as the corrupt power structure of Las Vegas. On September 20, 1998, the former Spetsnaz lieutenant launched what would be the most audacious and ruthless series of high-profile casino and armored car robberies that Las Vegas had ever seen. In a brazen sixteen-month-long reign of terror, he and his tightly disciplined crew would hit the crème de la crème of Vegas hotels: the MGM, the Desert Inn, the New York-New York, the Mandalay Bay, and the Bellagio. They struck hard and fast, then vanished without a trace. Millions of dollars were stolen. Two brave men were gunned down in cold blood; others were wounded. And yet the robberies were so well planned and executed that the police–“the stupids,” as Vigoa contemptuously referred to them–were all but helpless.
Not Lt. John Alamshaw. The twenty-three-year veteran, in charge of robbery detectives, was not giving up so easily. For him, Vigoa’s rampage was a personal affront. And he would do whatever it took, even risk his badge, to bring Vigao down.
With exclusive access to all the major players, including Vigoa and Alamshaw, veteran journalist and network producer John Huddy is the perfect man to tell the gripping never-before-told story of this harrowing true-crime drama that will leave readers breathless.
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: Doesn't Pass the Test
Comment: 1) The narrative about the crimes of Jose Vigoa is very good, but I give the book only one star because of the Cuba section and the previous history of Vigoa, there it does not pass the "s... test", as recommended by Ernest Hemingway in his famous interview with George Plimpton.
2) You see, I also came with the Mariel boatlift, and being a little older than Vigoa, can judge the narrative in the book even a little better. I am convinced that Vigoa took the author for a ride on his story up to 1980. This, given the intelligence and personality traits of the criminal, was to be expected, so I question whether Mr. Huddy allowed himself to be deceived on purpose or if there is a dishonest factor to make the book more marketable. This book is obviously written by an American for Americans, for how can it be otherwise when you often find mistakes even in the "Cuban dialect" phrases, for Christ' sake this is not Icelandic and there are many Cubans around for corroboration. Moreover, the Peruvian embassy asylum affair did not start right after the bus forced its entry into the embassy, but days later after Fidel could not get the Peruvian to return the asylum seekers and opened the gates in retaliation. The part of the Soviet Spetznats, the Angola sting followed by Afghanistan, the little time available for all that to happen given the age of Vigoa, the so-called disappearance of children aged 13 to 16 in Cuba at the time, even the way he left town, I assure you do not pass the smell test. I was not told, I was there all along.
3) Wouldn't you expect an author of caliber to try to corroborate these claims by a liar and criminal before putting them in black and white in a book? Norman Mailer was in Moscow for months researching the recently-opened KGB archives when writing "Oswald's Tales". Doesn't the public and reader deserve better?
4) Scumbag Jose Vigoa is not uncommon, unfortunately, in Cuba. He is really "The New Man" of the Che Guevara, the Boogie Man of Cubans. He represents most of what is wrong in there today mixed with several good traits of character, like Hitler, according to psychiatrist Jung, was the epitome of the dark shadow of the German nation's soul.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Action/Adventure
Comment: Real life action. Awesome criminal mindset! Shows that you can come to this country and achieve the American dream"Even if it's Illegal"!!
Customer Rating:
Summary: This Review Does No Justice To The Book
Comment: What a story...one of my top picks from the non-fiction genre. Action, adventure, brutality, justice. Amazing story.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Disappointing
Comment: The cover blurb got me to buy this book; it led me to think I was going to read some sort of real life "Ocean's 11." But it's not. The author recounts a series of what amount to snatch-and-grab armored car heists as well as a botched cashier's cage robbery at the Bellagio. The robberies are not very interesting, and the characters aren't very interesting either. There's too much luck, incompetence and happenstance in the events, all of which diffuse any drama. Added to that is the fact the author can't decide in which tense to write the book -- he jumps from present tense to past tense, in a rather disorganized way, while providing lots of extraneous detail. This would have been much better as a 40 or 50 page section of an anthology crime book, but at this length, it's bloated. If the subject interests you, check it out of the library...it's certainly not good enough to warrant a place on your bookshelf.
Customer Rating:
Summary: A story that needed telling.
Comment: This is an amazing story, with details little known even in Nevada.
The writing could be better, but it's still worth reading.
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