Bolita in Havana

The empleado for whom Carlos works comes by his house around 7:00. The empleado is friendly enough, but definitely in a hurry. His brown eyes are wide and watching. He's younger and skinnier than Carlos, wearing a cream-colored linen guayabera and sagging houndstooth-checked pants. He gracefully fishes a pack of Populares from his front pocket, expertly folds up the lists Carlos gives him, and slips them into the cigarette pack. The money -- what's left after Carlos has paid himself 30 percent of all he collected today -- the empleado stuffs into his pants. He has to pick up lists and money from all of his listeros and make it to the meeting house by 8:00. "I'll go to prison for two years if they catch me," he cautions with a valiant grimace.

"Once a lot of police arrived outside just as he was about to leave," Carlos recounts. "We were sure they'd come for him, so we had to think fast, and we ended up pushing him out of a window in back. It turned out the police were going to some other house for a completely different reason, and no one was in trouble."

At the agreed-upon meeting place, the empleados sit around a table and go over all of their lists, about 100 in all. This is where the winners are singled out and prize money calculated, as well as each empleado's cut. And where it's an easy matter to change or add all kinds of information to a list, hacer trampa, trick the bank out of money. Even though empleados are always carefully chosen and trusted friends and relatives, trampas are regularly made and most sooner or later discovered. (The ex-banker from Santiago affirms, "I had to guard my lists like my bride.")

The next morning at around 9:00 or 10:00 the empleado delivers the prize money (if there are any winners) to Carlos. Empleados are paid a salary by their banquero plus 10 percent of what's left over after the prize money is distributed. "There have been plenty of times a banquero has given prize money to a listero but the listero didn't pay [the winner]," Carlos intones. "Of course this will cause the listero to lose clients, probably drive him out of business. If an empleado tricks the banquero, it can cost him his life. It's rare -- in 43 years [since bolita was outlawed] I know of two men who have been killed around here for this. The banquero can also pay someone to beat up the guy but not kill him. That's more common. I've been there once when it happened. I always like to say this is a mafia, but a peaceful mafia."

And compared with U.S.-style bolita, Cuba's is tame. Police in Miami-Dade County believe several murders over the past twenty years were bolita-related, though they've never proved a connection. And there were the notorious mid-Eighties firebombings in New York. More than 60 people died in this war between the Italian and Cuban mafias over control of bolita in New York, New Jersey, and Florida. The firebombings (more than 120) and accompanying murders triggered presidential and congressional investigations and brought into public view "the Bolita King," José Miguel Battle.

The Cuban vice detective-turned-Bay of Pigs veteran was said by police and federal witnesses to control lucrative bolita operations in New York, New Jersey, Tampa, and Miami. The South Florida Business Journal named Battle in 1986 as one of the 21 richest South Floridians, with a net worth of $200 million. Police always suspected he was responsible for more than 30 murders. But they never nailed him on more than passport fraud and firearms possession. In 1999 Battle was released from federal prison after doing a little more than two years.

While the Italians and Cubans continue to share in the bolita action up north, Florida is Cuban territory, according to Miami-Dade Police Det. David Shanks, who has been investigating bolita operations for fifteen years. Battle is in poor health and has retired from his "corporation," as many call it, but a relative still controls the huge $100 million-per-year tax-free bolita business in South Florida. Police say a small ring of Cuban immigrants with an estimated 1000-2000 employees and subcontractors throughout South Florida rake in the cash. Within the past decade law enforcement officials have arrested a chosen few low-level workers (penalties for misdemeanor gambling in South Florida usually doesn't exceed small fines and probation) in order to get to the bigger bolita fish. A half-dozen of them have gone to prison on federal money laundering and gambling racketeering charges.

"In Miami especially there are a lot of independent operators," Shanks says. "But somewhere along the line, we've found, even the independent operations are linked up to the top of the corporation. We've now had a generational shift: The fathers used to control it, now the sons do."