Originally Posted by Turnbull
BTW: Meyer Lansky, the real-life "Roth," did not own casinos in Havana until very late. He was a big pal of Batista, the once and future dictator of Cuba. After Batista returned in a coup in 1952, he found that tourists were staying away because gambling was hopelessly crooked. Batista brought in Lansky to clean up gambling because Lansky had a reputation for giving the suckers a fair shake--he wasn't greedy, house odds were good enough for him. Batista paid him $100k/year--a small fortune then. He installed his brother Jake as casino manager at the Nacional, and I'm guessing he was in on the skim. But, Santos Trafficante, the Don of Tampa, FL, was the biggest actual owner in Havana. Lansky was the gatekeeper between Batista and the gangsters, and he probably profited from that arrangement, too.

Lansky finally built a hotel/casino, the Riviera, with $5 million of his money and another $6 million from Batista and others. It opened in March, 1958, and started making big bucks. Then Castro took over in January 1959, and Lansky lost everything.
I doubt! Roth would have used / lost his own money like Meyer Lansky

The ever astute Roth as clever as he is, would have sweet talked all the other 'investors' into financing his [American and Cuban] interests and since Roth always made money for his partners there would have been no complaints

No wonder Roth still had all his millions to offer for his rejected asylum in various countries

Michael too was going to invest $2 million if not for the Tahoe shooting and “the rebels could win”