Roth's plan was to lure Michael to Cuba, get the $2 million, and have him assassinated in the small hours of January 1, 1959. Why would he try to engineer an incredibly dangerous, split-second-timed rescue of Frankie? So that Frankie would hate Michael and testify against him at a Senate hearing weeks or months away, by which time, according to Roth's Havana timetable, Michael would be long dead?
I don't think it's a problem to have Plan A and Plan B. Michael might not show up in Havana. If Roth died before Havana, he could go to Hell happy in the knowledge that his perjury trap was in place.
It was pretty obvious that the cop who happened on the scene wasn't clued in on it.
I think you're right about this, so I'd like to reverse my answer specifically with respect to Roth engineering the entry of the cop.
Still, I think Roth's engineering of the overall incident has to stand, because otherwise too many random people would have to not notice or not blab that Frankie was in police custody and being moved around.
