Tales from the Morgue: Plantation is tipped to raid

PLANTATION IS TIPPED TO RAID

Sheriff Calls on Night Club, Finds Nobody Playing Game

Two well known northside gambling games which have been allowed to run openly for months, one of which had apparently been tipped off before the raiding party arrived, were closed by Sheriff John Belton between 10:30 and 11 o'clock last night.

The games were at the Plantation cafe, a night club operated by Bob Nardelli which is located four miles north of Tucson on the Oracle road, and at the Venice Gardens, operated by Mike Saracio and situated northeast of the city at the intersection of Swan and Fort Lowell roads.

Both establishments had been the subject of numerous complaints.

The Plantation casino, the second raided and the more pretentious of the two, had apparently been tipped off that the raid was impending, observers said.

Roulette, black jack and crap game equipment, together with stacks of chips, were in ship-shape order in the small outer building northeast of the cafe proper, but there were no players around the usually crowded tables when the officers arrived.

Belton and Deputy Gus Vasquez, his assistant, seized the roulette wheel, chips and the cover of the crap table, and placed Billy Reams under arrest as operator of the establishment establishment.

Several operators and other assistants In the establishment stood about noncommitally while Reams helped Belton pack up the equipment.

The Plantation raid had been preceded a half hour by one at the Venice Gardens, where Belton and Vasquez seized a chuck-a-luck "cage" and attendant equipment, which were standing on the night club's bar.

Joe Gross was placed under arrest at this establishment.

Reams and Gross will appear before D. G. Chalmer, justice of the peace, at 10 o'clock this morning.

Belton said that he was unsuccessful in an attempted raid on a third northside night club, but that he intended to close the place up "immediately."