0:08

School of Humans. This

0:13

is racket inside the Gold Club.

0:15

I'm Christina Lee. This is episode

0:18

four The Magnificent Seven.

0:22

The Gold Club employees knew they were

0:24

being watched. Across

0:26

the street from the club was a bank. Kaplan's

0:29

right hand man, Ziggy, noticed

0:31

one of the bank's cameras was turned suspiciously

0:34

toward the club. He

0:36

asked owner Steve Kaplan what should they do

0:38

about it, but Kaplan wasn't

0:40

worried. Ziggy suggested he

0:42

planted some trees out front to obscure

0:45

the view, just in case Jack

0:48

and Bush or Diva swore

0:50

someone was following her. But

0:52

it was the raid in March nineteen ninety nine

0:55

when they knew for sure who had eyes

0:57

on them, and no, it

0:59

wasn't the mob. It was a more threatening

1:02

force to Kaplin the FBI.

1:05

After the raid, Kaplan knew he had

1:07

to protect himself and his employees, so

1:10

we sought out the most prominent criminal defense

1:12

team he could find. You guys need

1:14

to call me more offer than I don't get any fucking

1:16

phone calls. And then as soon as we get on this, I

1:18

feel had like eight phone calls and

1:21

that's one of them. Sabby people selling

1:24

me insurance. But okay,

1:26

so we're in the middle of a pandemic and

1:29

we started interviewing people for this podcast

1:31

right when everything started shutting down,

1:34

which meant that we couldn't interview anyone in

1:37

person, even though we all live

1:39

in Atlanta. So

1:41

there was this learning curve with some of

1:43

Atlanta's most coveted and accomplished

1:45

lawyers on how to record their

1:47

side of the interview on their iPhones.

1:50

I'm hitting it. This is new

1:52

recording three. By

1:54

the way, Okay, all right, can go

1:56

back. Oh, don't

1:58

go back. Don't go back. I can't repeat it. I

2:02

can't do it. It's already done. That

2:05

was our users talking with attorney Bruce

2:07

Harvey, who ends up representing Jacqueline.

2:10

What was your initial impression

2:12

of Jacqueline? Can you tell us a little bit about

2:14

her? Now, Jackie was their

2:17

premier dancer, their

2:19

premier seller, and

2:23

she was very close to Steve

2:25

Kaplan. So my first impression

2:27

was, well, she must be something,

2:30

she must be something. This is a very

2:32

famous national club. People come

2:34

from all over the country to see

2:37

the club and to see Jackie Bush.

2:40

Can you tell us about the first time that you met Jacquelin?

2:43

No, because I don't remember, okay,

2:47

I'm assuming it was at

2:49

the Gold Club. Of course

2:51

I had never been in there before, because I would

2:54

never go into an establishment

2:56

like that. But due

2:58

to my professional responsibilities,

3:01

of course I wanted to go. Are

3:06

you saying now with a hint of sarcasm?

3:09

I hope you could hear that hint

3:11

of sarcasm in my voice.

3:14

Jacklin didn't like the first attorney her boss

3:16

recommended because, quote, he

3:19

talked to me like I was guilty already,

3:22

answer Bruce Harvey. Jacqueline

3:24

recognized Harvey not just from

3:27

his signature Ponytail, but she

3:29

knew of him from other major trials he had worked

3:31

on, and Harvey was just

3:33

one of the seven defense attorneys. One

3:36

journalist referenced a classic Western

3:38

when she dubbed them the Magnificent

3:40

seven. Okay,

3:46

cool, so let's concert

3:48

it. So will you please tell me your name and

3:51

who you're presented in the Gold Club trial? My

3:53

name is Steve Sadou and I represented

3:55

Steve Kaplan. Attorney

3:58

Steve Sada was at the helm of the defense

4:00

team. Sada was already

4:02

a reputable criminal defense attorney

4:04

in Atlanta, but Sado

4:07

wasn't Kaplan's first choice. For representation.

4:10

The night the FBI raided the Gold Club,

4:13

Sado headed straight over. I

4:16

kept my eye on the FBI and the irs

4:19

as they did the search. I got to know

4:21

a little bit about the club's operations, and

4:24

I figured that this was going to meet

4:26

into the biggest case that I ever handled,

4:28

and I was thrilled. And then

4:30

I waited for Steve Kaplan to let me know

4:33

that I was going to lead the charge in defending

4:35

his club in himself. Then

4:37

came some bad news. Kaplan

4:40

already had his choice of attorneys, big

4:42

wigs from his native New York to

4:45

be told thereafter. I could

4:47

kind of stick around as the local representative,

4:49

but I really wasn't going to be a participant. Obviously,

4:52

I was somewhat devastated, but I knew I was still involved

4:55

in the case. But Kaplan shoot

4:57

up or chewed out those big wigs, and

4:59

it'd be on to the next one. This

5:01

happened three times and Sada

5:04

was kept on the sideline. So

5:06

for the next several months, I was

5:08

relegated to the what's the

5:11

best way to say it, the total lackey.

5:13

You know, you need to go picked up

5:15

dinner. If he were here, I want to

5:17

get dinner. I was at the role

5:20

that I would never want to play, but I didn't want

5:22

to lose contact with the case. That

5:29

changed when Caplan saw stayed out working

5:31

the Ray Lewis murder trial. On

5:35

January thirty first, two thousand, Joseph

5:37

Sweeting, Reginald Oakley, and

5:40

Baltimore Ravens linebacker Ray Lewis

5:42

were charged with two stabbing murders.

5:44

The morning after Atlanta hosted Super

5:46

Bowl thirty four, Lewis,

5:48

Sweeting, and Oakley were at the Cobalt Lounge,

5:51

another nightlife fixture, and as

5:53

they were leaving the club, they were confronted

5:55

by a group of men. Words

5:57

were exchanged, there was a fight,

6:00

and two people died, but

6:02

Lewis and his entourage fled the scene in their

6:04

limo. Sadow

6:07

represented Lewis's friend, Joseph Sweeting.

6:11

This was a big celebrity trial,

6:13

and Kaplan and some of the other Gold Club

6:15

employees went to see how Sada

6:17

would handle it. Let's

6:20

just say that I was having

6:22

one of my best performances, at least

6:24

in the courtroom.

6:29

The jury acquitted Sadow's client after

6:32

only forty five minutes of deliberation.

6:35

Steve Capel was impressed, so

6:37

they finally had a meeting. Steve

6:40

comes to me in the office. He says,

6:42

Hey, I don't want these New York lawyers

6:44

anymore. How much more money do you want

6:46

to just run the whole show? And I

6:48

said Finally, the

6:51

real work was about to begin. Sayda

6:54

reunited with Bruce Harvey, who represented

6:56

Oakley and would now take on Jacqueline

6:59

Don Samuel, who co represented Lewis,

7:02

would be assigned to Caplan's accountant, Larry

7:04

Glad. The rest of the team

7:07

were attorneys Craig Gillen, Dwight Thomas,

7:09

Nick Latito, and another Bruce

7:12

Bruce Morris. But

7:14

first the ray Lewis jury reached

7:17

a verdict not guilty on

7:19

all counts. To

7:21

celebrate their victory and the ray Lewis

7:23

Trial, Say It Allen Harvey took their

7:25

clients on a limo ride to

7:28

the Gold Club. We'll

7:31

be right back when

7:45

the indictment came down in November nineteen

7:47

ninety nine. The first task at hand was

7:49

keeping the Gold Club open since

7:52

Atlanta Mayor's Bill Campbell wanted to take

7:54

away its liquor license. That

7:57

fell into the hands of Alan Begner. The

7:59

Gold club's lawyer, who told us

8:01

about how the musical Hair led

8:03

to the rise of Atlanta's asshole nick

8:05

at strip clubs. When the

8:07

indictment came down,

8:10

Bill Campbell was mayor and he

8:12

used for the first time the emergency

8:16

powers in the City of Atlanta's

8:18

alcohol code to revoke their license

8:21

without a hearing, without due

8:23

process, without appeal. Begner

8:26

suggests that this was a political move on

8:28

Campbell's part because Campbell

8:30

was about to be federally indated as well

8:33

for rocketeering, wire fraud,

8:35

and bribery, including from strip

8:38

clubs. He'd eventually

8:40

spent a year in prison for tax evasion. He

8:43

knew he was going to be indicted and

8:45

that another adult club owner

8:48

would testify that he gave

8:50

bribes to Mayor Campbell and wanted

8:53

to show he was tough on new dance

8:55

clubs. Begner's

8:57

move worked, which meant that

8:59

from nineteen ninety nine to two thousand and one

9:02

it was business as usual Optical Club.

9:08

So Begner isn't one of the Magnificent

9:10

Seven. He was the Gold Club's

9:13

regular civil suit lawyer, handling

9:15

those run of the mill credit card fraud

9:17

cases from the nineties. Begner

9:21

is also a strip club regular. In

9:23

his office, he proudly displays

9:25

a wooden bat that someone used to attack

9:28

a security guard at Tattletale,

9:30

his favorite strip club in Atlanta.

9:33

Tattletale is a decisively more

9:36

casual place than the Gold Club, though

9:39

Begner has also been to the Gold Club

9:41

plenty of times for work

9:43

and pleasure. Meanwhile,

9:46

most of the Magnificent Seven claimed that they'd

9:49

only been to the Gold Club strictly

9:51

on business. When

9:53

we won the Ray Lewis trial, my client

9:55

had been incose rated since the day's arrest in January

10:00

two thousand and

10:03

he's found not guilty. We

10:05

celebrate at the Gold Club. That was literally

10:08

the first time I had ever gone to the

10:10

Gold Club other than

10:13

as potential counsel for the Gold

10:15

Club. Like the Gold Club's defense team,

10:18

prosecutor Art Leech swears that

10:20

he's never stepped inside the Gold Club,

10:23

not even during his own investigation thing.

10:26

I just said, never going

10:28

to darken that door ever. And

10:31

we had some intelligence that came

10:33

back to us through the FBI where

10:35

they were actually searching the tapes to see

10:38

if I had ever been at the Gold

10:40

Club, but they were wasting

10:42

their time because I had never crossed

10:44

that threshold. Ever, still,

10:47

after the raid, Leech's investigation

10:49

overtook business as usual at the Gold

10:51

Club. The staff was being interviewed

10:54

by FBI agents and getting

10:56

subpoenat left and right. So Kapitalan

10:59

asked, say it out if he could come buy the club

11:01

to give some reassurance. Everyone

11:06

realizes at some point maybe

11:08

this is going to be the end of the club. The entertainers

11:10

are concerned because that's their livelihood. If the club

11:12

shuts down, you know, they're out of a

11:14

job. And I don't know what you've been told,

11:17

but the entertainers, the dancers

11:19

at the club made serious

11:21

money, really serious

11:23

money. We're talking about hundreds of thousands

11:25

of dollars a year. So Steve

11:28

comes up to me one point and says, you

11:31

know, if you could come

11:33

by the club every once in a while, some

11:35

of the girls have got club questions. Maybe

11:38

you can answer some of the questions. Make everybody feel

11:40

good that things are still moving along in the right

11:42

direction. Sadale

11:44

started regularly going to the club, usually

11:47

staying for a half hour, and to

11:50

show his propriety, he often brought

11:52

his wife with him. She had always been

11:54

interested to know what went on in there. She's heard

11:56

stories. So we would go into the club.

11:59

We would never go to the private room. We

12:01

would sit up on the second floor in

12:03

the balcony that overlooks the stage,

12:05

and I would sit there with her and we

12:07

would wait to see if girls

12:10

came over and they wanted to ask questions, and they would come

12:12

over. They would ask

12:14

a couple of questions, and they always felt, because

12:17

of who I was and the role I had,

12:20

that maybe I should have a lap dance. Naturally,

12:23

these entertainers wanted to show their appreciation.

12:27

They would say, you know, would you like

12:29

a lap dance? And I would always

12:32

look at my wife and she'd give me that look like

12:35

that ain't happening. Capa

12:47

was pretty involved in building up his case. He

12:50

was always coming up with ideas. So

12:52

while the government could subpoena people for grand

12:55

jury, Capa wondered if there

12:57

was a way the defense could collect their own

12:59

testimony. Steve

13:01

comes to me and he says, you know, the government

13:04

takes people. Can

13:07

we tape people? And I

13:09

said yes actually, And

13:12

Steve said, well, if we can tape, what

13:14

are your thoughts? And I said, well, you know,

13:16

who's gonna Who's gonna do

13:18

this taping? Kaplan

13:20

realized that while he didn't have

13:22

cameras and wire taps, he

13:25

did have the power of seduction on

13:27

his side. And he said

13:30

the girls, And I said

13:32

the girls, He said, yeah, the entertainers,

13:35

the dancers, the people that

13:38

I've been loyal to on are loyal to me. They

13:40

all come to me and say how can they help? And

13:43

this is what they could do. And

13:46

it occurred to me immediately upon him

13:48

saying that the individuals

13:51

being recorded and having the conversation

13:54

would be they're most open. They

13:56

wouldn't be guarded because they think

13:58

they're impressing the

14:00

woman they're talking to. Men's

14:04

ego would take whole of the situation.

14:07

Patrons were more than willing to sing Kaplan's

14:09

praises when being interviewed by the entertainers

14:12

with a sexy sluice in action. The

14:15

defense ended up with more than three hundred

14:17

hours of recordings

14:24

during the grand jury investigation. As

14:26

Leech continued to collect evidence, the

14:29

indictment was revised two more times.

14:32

The first version was already one hundred

14:34

pages long, but the third

14:36

and final version had thirty more

14:38

pages of charges. As

14:42

we talked about on the last episode. The

14:44

overwhelming charge and the indictment was rico.

14:47

To be charged. Under RICO, at least

14:49

two separate crimes need to be proven. In

14:52

legal terms, these crimes are called a predicate

14:54

acts. For

14:56

example, the indictment accused Kaplan

14:58

abribing Delta Airlines employees

15:00

with booze and entertainers in

15:03

exchange for discounted airfare to where

15:05

he chose. During

15:08

the grand jury and Atlanta drug

15:10

dealers said that he sold drugs to Ziggie

15:12

and some Gold Club managers. He

15:15

said that he had the bathroom valet selling

15:17

his goods and collected the earnings at

15:19

the end of every night. He

15:22

guessed that sixty percent of whoever was

15:24

inside the Gold Club at any given

15:26

time were on some kind of drugs,

15:29

mostly cocaine. The

15:32

grand jury does permit hearsay, so

15:35

take all this with a grain of salt. But

15:37

for the Gold Club defense, the scope

15:40

of the trial was becoming so immense that

15:42

many of those predicate acts became

15:44

footnotes. The

15:48

story of Reginald Bernie also got overlooked,

15:51

even though he was one of the seven defendants

15:53

going to trial. Bernie

15:56

was a retired Atlanta police officer

15:58

who pivoted to working as a security guard

16:00

and club consultant. Since

16:03

he worked in permits while at the police department,

16:05

he was well versed in what strip clubs

16:07

could and could not do. Sometimes,

16:10

at the Gold Club's weekly meetings Bertie

16:12

was there, he would tell staff that everyone,

16:15

including bouncers, needed a permit

16:17

to work at the club. He'd tell

16:20

entertainers to please stop engaging

16:22

in lewd behavior. In

16:24

Atlanta. While you can be asshole

16:26

naked, you cannot be lewed like

16:29

intentionally spreading your cheeks. Just

16:32

to give an example. The

16:34

government alleged that before Bernie

16:36

retired, he accepted a five

16:39

thousand dollar bribe from Kaplan to

16:41

get the Gold Club a Sunday local license.

16:44

He'd let Kaplan know if his office

16:46

was going to pay the Goal Club a surprise visit,

16:49

and like the rest of the defendants, Bernie

16:52

was charged under RICO, meaning

16:54

he was somehow helping Kaplan funnel money

16:57

to the mob. The

17:00

Gold Club frequently comped Bertie's drinks,

17:02

as restaurants and convenience stores

17:04

often do with policeman and firefighters,

17:08

but the insictment points to this gesture almost

17:10

as if it were another bribe, if

17:12

not some sign that Bernie was being offered

17:15

sex as well. Bernie's

17:17

lawyer, Dwight Thomas figured

17:20

that the government threw him into the mix

17:22

just to make this whole case even sexier.

17:25

You've got a dirty cop that you're

17:28

thrown into the slad. What

17:30

you're trying to do is give it some local flavors,

17:32

so people just have a bad

17:34

taste in the mouth. So I don't want

17:36

this. You know, I'm going to convict simply

17:39

because the government says they got a dirty cop

17:41

in this situation. The

17:43

police officer has that badge on

17:46

the sworn to uphold and protect

17:48

the law, is involved

17:50

in criminal activity with the mob. That's

17:53

even you know, that's even sexier for

17:56

the prosecutors to present to the people.

17:59

Yet dirty cops, along with bribery

18:02

and drugs were the least of

18:04

the concerns. We'll

18:08

be right back. Like

18:20

most things in the world, the Gold

18:22

clubcase boils down to money,

18:24

where it came from, how it was

18:27

used, and where it ended up. In

18:30

grand jury testimony, some staff

18:33

and even former owner John Kirkendall

18:35

complained about the Gold Club's cash flow.

18:38

According to Kirkendall, once Kaplan

18:41

took over the club, he stopped making

18:43

daily deposits at the bank and started

18:45

paying staff and vendors under the table.

18:49

During a visit to Atlanta, Kirkendall

18:51

stopped by the Gold Club from Kaplan

18:53

to literally hand him a brown paper

18:56

bag with about eight thousand dollars

18:58

in bills. Apparently

19:00

this was his cut for the week at the club.

19:04

Kirkandall swears that Kapham once told

19:06

him that he'd rather pay people with cash

19:08

to avoid being taxed. He

19:11

also said that Kaplan supplied the Gold Club

19:14

with bootleg liquor. Most

19:16

states require getting alcohol from an authorized

19:18

distributor, but Kirgndaal claimed

19:20

that Kaplan got his bottles delivered in some

19:23

unmarked van Kirkendall

19:26

said, the stuff you read about

19:28

and see in movies was happening to

19:30

me at the Gold Club. I'm

19:33

telling you it was right out of a fiction

19:35

movie or novel. Attorney

19:40

Don Samuel, who was defending accountant

19:42

Larry Glyde, says that a cash problem

19:44

at the Gold Club wasn't possible. Where

19:48

would all this cash come from if the

19:50

Gold Club's clients hell were platinum

19:52

cardholders. Larry

19:55

Glade had nothing to do with cash

19:57

and In fact, I'm not aware that there was

20:01

substantial cash at the Gold Club at all. It

20:03

was that was not that kind of club. Was

20:05

not the kind of club where

20:07

people came and, you know, bought

20:09

drinks with twenty dollar bills. This

20:12

is the kind of club where people came in and bought

20:14

drinks with platinum Amex cards. You

20:17

know, like sometimes tips would be paid

20:19

in cash from the club if

20:23

the entertainers wanted that, or you know,

20:25

cocktail waitresses wanted to be paid in cash,

20:27

but there just wasn't enough cash really

20:29

to pay the employees like that.

20:32

That was just mythical. Speaking

20:35

of platinum cards, Samuel

20:37

pointed out that only eighteen people were

20:40

included in the indictment for credit card fraud

20:42

at the Goal Club, and since

20:44

thousands of people have visited the club on

20:46

a yearly basis, the charge

20:48

of credit card frauds seemed overblown,

20:52

more like a mistake than a scheme. Also,

20:56

prosecution described Kaplan's upselling

20:58

strategy remember what they called the

21:00

formula, as part of a larger

21:02

scam. Samuel

21:04

struggled to see which parts of the formula

21:06

were actually illegal. A

21:09

lot of people got very drunk there, A lot of

21:11

people you know, one or two in the morning,

21:13

they're on their third bottle of champagne.

21:16

You know, they're signing everything, they're signing anything,

21:19

and they're just buying more and more booze,

21:21

and there's more and more girls coming up. You

21:23

know. I guess you could say they were being taken advantage

21:26

of it, but they were willingly spending their money.

21:29

And I'm not sure that that's a crime, just

21:31

by you know, taking advantage of incredibly

21:34

wealthy people who were incredibly drunk

21:36

and spending a lot of money. You

21:39

know. It's it's one thing, you know, at you

21:42

know, to take advantage of someone who's spending their last

21:44

buck, you know, gambling

21:46

and clearly doesn't have the money to go home and feed their

21:48

family that night. It's another

21:51

thing, you know, to you know, someone who's

21:53

walking around with a platinum Amex card

21:55

and wining and dining his customers, to you

21:58

know, encourage them to keep eating, keep eating, keep

22:00

drinking, keep drinking, by another steak, by

22:02

another dome perry on. It's

22:05

nice. You know, I see that as being morally

22:08

different and certainly

22:10

not crossing the line of illegality. The

22:18

government also accused Steve Kaplan of

22:20

arranging sex between Gold Club dancers

22:23

and VIP clientele, and

22:25

according to prosecution, this

22:27

was prosecution Prosecutor

22:30

Art Leech needed to prove that money changed

22:32

hands with either the entertainers or Kaplan

22:35

himself for sex. Meanwhile,

22:38

Sado asked whether sex as

22:40

defined by the State of Georgia actually

22:43

happened. Sado found

22:45

a loophole in Leech's case. Keep

22:48

in mind that the year before the raid, the

22:50

nation was trying to figure out what exactly

22:53

happened between President Bill Clinton and

22:55

Monica Lewinsky. Clinton

22:57

said, I did not have sexual

23:00

relations with that woman. But

23:03

the longer the impeachment trial wore off on,

23:06

the more the core legal experts

23:08

and the general public debated over

23:10

whether oral sex actually counts as

23:12

sex. As we

23:14

are preparing, I kept

23:17

seeing over and over that

23:19

it was oral sex that

23:22

people were talking about, not

23:24

sexual intercourse. And I

23:28

hate to go to Bill Clinton, but there is a

23:30

difference. So I went in to

23:32

see what constituted prostitution

23:35

under george law. Now,

23:37

the statute said it had to be sexual

23:40

intercourse. If you read the law

23:42

in Georgia clear as day at that point

23:44

it said sexual intercourse. That

23:47

means all the times the indictment references

23:49

blowjobs, hand jobs, or lesbian

23:52

sex shows as prostitution. That

23:54

can't be because as defined

23:56

by the law, prostitution can

23:58

only be intercourse. The

24:01

law has changed since then, and

24:04

even at the time of the Goal Club case that

24:06

was confusing. Sado did find

24:09

some cases that had previously ruled

24:11

oral sex's prostitution, but

24:15

he decided some willful ignorance might

24:17

be better than emitting that fact into

24:19

evidence, because some things

24:21

are just better held back. The

24:27

defense team had one last big problem

24:30

what to do with Michael de Leonardo,

24:33

otherwise known as Mikey Scars,

24:35

alleged mobster. Michael

24:39

was a very strong willed individual

24:42

and at that time

24:45

was alleged to be a high ranking member

24:47

of an organized crime family and

24:50

was not used to receiving

24:53

directions, and that it was

24:55

important to make sure that Michael

24:58

was kind of kept under some control

25:01

because he was a bigger than life character

25:03

and if he was too

25:06

big, it might give the

25:08

wrong impression in a courtroom

25:10

about who was controlling who. Like

25:13

how Reginald Bernie was added to the indictment,

25:15

Sadal thought that organized crime was thrown

25:17

in to make the case more exciting. And

25:20

that these charges weren't overreach by the government.

25:23

The government had overreached. They had

25:25

created criminal activity when none

25:27

existed. They had, particularly

25:29

when it came to organized crime,

25:32

they had put that into it because, oh

25:34

my god, organized crime has

25:36

come to River City, which is the old song, had

25:38

come to Atlanta, and we had to get rid of

25:40

him. Suddenly, the prosecution was

25:42

framing to Leonardo as the top of

25:45

the Gold Club's money chain, but

25:47

the defense team needed to prove that Kaplan

25:49

was running the ship, so no

25:52

mafia involvement. Di

25:54

Leonardo was a named a defendant in the Gold

25:56

Club trial until the third draft.

25:58

In the indictment, he was then accused

26:01

of money laundering, obstruction of justice,

26:03

and extorting the New York strip club Scores

26:06

during the nineties. The

26:08

third draft is also when everything about

26:10

Scores came to Late in

26:13

the grand jury, Art Leech talked to Scores

26:15

two owners about Steve Kaplan. They

26:18

said that they had connected with Kaplan through Gambino

26:20

associates. At

26:22

first, Kaplan was just offering them business advice,

26:26

like every time a cab dropped someone

26:28

off at Scores, they should tip them five bucks.

26:31

That way, the cab driver will recommend Scores

26:33

to people looking for a good time, but

26:36

then their meetings escalated. Kaplan

26:39

told them they should build private VIP rooms,

26:42

get the customers super drunk, and

26:44

get them to the rooms where they could do whatever

26:47

they wanted with the entertainers and

26:50

get charged for it. At

26:53

the time of their meetings, the Scores

26:55

owners were wearing wires because they were working

26:57

with the FBI, and

26:59

in a conversation captured between Kaplan

27:02

and the Scores owners, it became

27:04

clear why Jacklin Bush was so taken

27:06

aback by how Kaplan talks. According

27:09

to the transcript, Kaplan says, any

27:12

fucking guy wants, any bitch wants a fucking

27:14

floor man to sit down. I don't give a fuck,

27:16

go in there. Fuck. The

27:23

defense refers to the Gold Club trial again

27:25

and again as a morality play

27:28

or a moral prosecution against

27:31

this booming strip club below the Bible belt.

27:33

It was an empty wagon. It made a lot

27:35

of noise. This is day Thomas again,

27:38

and he points out that a lot of the case

27:40

was now built around what had happened in New

27:43

York with Scores and all that, but

27:45

says it was a deliberate choice to bring the

27:47

case into the South because Southerners

27:50

well aren't supposed to like strip

27:52

clubs. The government in

27:54

Atlanta, actually the prosecuts, and they

27:57

could have brought this case of in New York, but they

27:59

didn't want to do that because they felt, number

28:01

one, New Yorkers are too liberal

28:03

about things and they would never buy

28:05

that idea. So they brought it south,

28:08

thinking that they can make a moralative

28:10

prosecution, that the Southerners here

28:13

would get caught up with the Christen hangups

28:15

and say, hey, you know this is dirty

28:17

dancing. Now you know this is loose

28:20

news, this is a moral you

28:22

know. At some point in time, people got to realize

28:24

the civil wars old. In

28:35

September two thousand, Kaplan

28:37

almost got re arrested. He'd

28:39

been out on bail, but police

28:41

wanted to throw him in jail on allegations

28:44

of witness intimidation. This

28:47

isn't the only time that prosecutions suspected

28:49

Kaplan a messing with their witnesses. Leech

28:53

said. A former Gold Club employee

28:55

was later attacked. They

28:58

beat her so severely that basically all

29:00

of her front teeth were knocked out in

29:03

an effort to intimidate her. And it worked. I

29:05

mean, we lost her for a long period of time, to say,

29:07

six months, where we could

29:09

not find her, could not communicate with her. We

29:12

were concerned for her physical

29:15

safety. In other words, was she's still alive? And

29:17

when we finally found her, it was

29:20

a really horrible situation. Art

29:24

Leech believes the attacker was hired

29:27

by none other than Steve Kaplan Next

29:42

time on Racket, Zak

29:45

was brought down here to help manage the club

29:47

and did so. He had insight into all

29:50

manner, every aspect. He

29:53

was a coward, no backbone at all.

29:56

I can't stand the thought

29:58

of that man. There were

30:00

several different instances where things happened

30:04

where he felt like he

30:06

was an immediate bodily harm

30:09

her. I can say she was just scared. She's

30:12

terrified. It's it's

30:14

very very difficult,

30:16

if not impossible, for people to resist

30:20

the siren call of the

30:22

government when they are

30:25

pressuring you to cooperate.

30:31

Oh my life has

30:34

been racking, racking,

30:39

racket, Oh

30:42

my life, My

30:47

life, Oh

30:56

my life.

31:00

Racket. Inside the Gold Club is a production

31:03

of School of Humans and iHeartRadio

31:06

Rackets, written and narrated by me Christina

31:08

Lee and produced by Gabby Watts.

31:11

Caroline Slaughter is our supervising producer

31:15

special thanks to Taylor church In Sonambashi

31:19

music is by Claire Campbell and

31:21

sound design and mixes by Tone Welders.

31:24

Executive producers are Brandon Barr,

31:26

Elsie Crowley and Brian Lavin,

31:29

along with Scott Grubman and Lauren Zimmerman

32:01

School of Humans