9.01.07Casino investor Strather has criminal past
By Stephanie Vosk
STAFF WRITER
Gambling tycoon Sol Kerzner isn't the only Mashpee Wampanoag casino investor with a charge of bribery on his record.
Detroit casino developer Herb Strather, the tribe's first and most visible investor, was arrested on a bribery charge in 1977 for trying to buy off a police officer in Michigan, according to a 1997 report in the Detroit Free Press.
Strather bankrolled the Wampanoag's effort to gain federal recognition, which cost millions of dollars. In exchange, Strather has said he would be given a portion of the development rights on a Wampanoag casino.
In 1997, two years before Strather started giving money to the Mashpee tribe, Strather told the Detroit Free Press that he was pulled over after drinking to celebrate a big real estate deal in 1977, and had an outstanding ticket on his record. When Strather offered the policeman a pair of new shoes if he let him pay the ticket the next day, he was arrested.
Strather paid a $500 fine and did community service for the misdemeanor, the Free Press reported.
The Times could not reach Strather for comment yesterday. Scott Ferson, the Wampanoag's spokesman, said yesterday that tribal leaders are aware of an arrest on Strather's record, though not of the specifics.
Shortly after federal officials granted the Mashpee Wampanoag preliminary federal recognition in March 2006, Strather told the Times he had given the tribe approximately $15 million, about two-thirds of which financed the tribe's quest for federal recognition.
Last spring, after the tribe officially received federal recognition, the tribe announced that Kerzner and his partner Len Wolman had signed on as the lead investors for a resort casino. Strather has since faded into the background of the tribe's quest to build a casino.
Kerzner and Wolman were the prime investors for the Mohegan Sun casino in Connecticut and Twin River gaming facility in Rhode Island.
Wolman said recently that he had a business relationship with Strather in Detroit prior to becoming involved with the Wampanoag.
Applicants for Indian casino licenses are intensely scrutinized by the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs. Others involved in the casino business, including investors, do not go through such stringent checks, if any, Ferson said.
The Mashpee Wampanoag Tribal Council plans to establish a gaming authority which will apply for, and if granted, hold the license for a casino, he said. The tribe never intended for Strather to hold the license, according to Ferson.
It's the licensees who have to be clean, he said. Bureau of Indian Affairs officials do not allow anyone with a felony conviction to be involved in casino operations.
The Mashpee Wampanoag Tribal Council has been in damage control mode for the past week following revelations that tribal council chairman Glenn Marshall was convicted of rape, a felony charge, in 1981. Marshall, 57, was also found to have lied about his military record when testifying before Congress. He resigned Monday.
"This is why the government has regulations on gaming," Ferson said of Marshall's conviction. "When the tribe applied for a license, that would have been known."
Kerzner, who was charged in 1986 of trying to bribe a South African government official in exchange for exclusive gaming rights, was never convicted. The charge was dismissed in 1997. He has since received at least one license from the Bureau of Indian Affairs to operate Mohegan Sun in Connecticut for a time. Kerzner has also secured commercial licenses in several states and abroad.
Strather, however, has had trouble getting a license.
In the 1990s, Atwater Entertainment, of which Strather was a founding partner, poured money into supporting a referendum question to allow casinos in Detroit. The grass-roots effort came after the Michigan governor ruled against allowing casinos in Detroit .
The referendum passed, and one of three licenses was subsequently given to Atwater for what would become the MotorCity Casino.
Nelson Westrin, former executive director of the Michigan Gaming Control Board, told the Times in 2001 that state investigators place any investor holding more than a 1-percent interest in a casino through a thorough background check.
The Detroit News reported at the time that Strather and his partner had experienced financial difficulties over their 25-year business relationship. They paid taxes late, and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development cited a real estate company they owned for several violations, the News reported.
Strather subsequently sold his interests in the casino, which opened in 1999.
John Page, deputy director of enforcement for the Michigan Gaming Control Board, would not release any details yesterday of Strather's involvement in Detroit casinos other than he was a license applicant and later sold his share.
Stephanie Vosk can be reached at svosk@capecodonline.com
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