Operator of Topless Bar Killed During Break-In at Home

The operator of a Santa Ana topless bar was shot and killed Thursday night by two men who broke into his condominium, tied up his girlfriend and made off with jewelry, furs, a Chevy Camaro and a Mercedes-Benz.

James Lee Casino, 48, an ex-convict, was led at gunpoint through his Buena Park home about 11:30 p.m. and forced to point out keys and valuables before he was shot once in the head with a small-caliber handgun, Buena Park police spokesman Terry Branum said.

Casino, whose real name was James Lee Stockwell, was a reputed gambler, convicted swindler and “controller” of the Mustang, a topless bar in Santa Ana that police claim has been used for “high-priced prostitution.”

Before Casino was shot, the intruders used a bandanna and a belt to tie his girlfriend, Shelly Faciones, 22, by the hands and feet, Branum said. She was able to free herself about 20 minutes after the shooting and called police from a neighbor’s house.

Faciones, shaken but not hurt, was examined at Martin Luther Hospital in Anaheim, Branum said.

The motive for the slaying was unclear late Friday, as police officers from Santa Ana, Buena Park, Anaheim and Los Angeles met in Buena Park to discuss the case. The FBI also was notified of the slaying, spokesman Fred Reagan said.

‘Anything’s a Possibility’

“So far it’s just a robbery, but anything’s a possibility at this point,” Branum said.

He said Faciones described the intruders as Latino but otherwise has provided little information about them. About 1:30 a.m. Friday, the California Highway Patrol found Casino’s Camaro abandoned on the Artesia Freeway near Knott Avenue. His 1984 Mercedes 550 SL was still missing. The intruders ignored Casino’s Rolls-Royce, which was still in the garage.

Casino has had a checkered career that has included two criminal convictions, rifts with business partners and several lawsuits.

According to law enforcement officials familiar with Casino, who spoke on the condition that they not be identified, he was born James Lee Stockwell on Dec. 25, 1938, but changed his name while serving a prison sentence after he saw a newspaper clipping about a federal investigation into money-skimming at a Las Vegas casino.

The headline, “Casino Under Federal Investigation,” inspired Stockwell to adopt a new name, they said.

However, attorney Alban P. Silva, who said he had represented Casino in business matters, said he believed that Casino changed his name to avoid association with a father who often beat him.

According to Silva, Casino was “an immensely successful person” and a “promoter type” who as a young man started 50 topless bars along the Sunset Strip in Los Angeles. When Casino was 21, Silva said, he lost the bars when he went to federal prison for tax evasion. After his release, Casino became involved in real estate ventures, a health product company, a gym and the Mustang club, Silva said.

Casino ran afoul of the law again in 1981, when the Los Angeles district attorney’s office sued him and a Pacific Palisades attorney, claiming that they had bilked investors in Cowboy Hotdogs Inc. out of $400,000. The company offered limited partnerships in a corporation that was supposed to build a chain of hotdog stands, but only one stand was ever constructed.

On Jan. 29, 1985, Casino pleaded guilty to conspiracy in the case and was ordered to pay restitution by Jan. 30, 1987, or face up to five years of prison. According to Silva, Casino had paid “partial restitution” and was planning to pay the full amount as due.

The Mustang club is a 250-seat topless bar on Harbor Boulevard in Santa Ana that opened in June, 1983. Santa Ana officials have targeted the bar in a citywide crackdown on topless dancing. In May, 1984, a number of bar employees, including a manager and five topless dancers, were arrested on prostitution or prostitution-related charges.

Mustang general manager Ron Leon on Friday described Casino as the club’s “controller” and said he came by to handle expenses, capital and promotions once or twice a week.

Santa Ana business-license records list Michael Walsh as president of the Mustang club, but lawsuits filed by individuals who loaned money to start the topless bar say Casino was its secret owner.

In a 1984 lawsuit seeking repayment of some of the bar’s start-up loans, attorney Meir J. Westreich of Santa Ana alleged that “Casino is the silent and true owner of Fortune Investments Inc. and the Mustang club and receives the lion’s share of the income from the club.”

Court records show that in a July, 1985, settlement of the lawsuit, Casino paid back $200,000 to C.W. Carroll and Yvonne Hines and that Casino agreed to pay an additional $25,000 within three months. In return, Carroll and Hines transferred to Casino all interest in Fortune Investments Inc. and interests in the bar securing the loans.

According to the lawsuit, which was filed by Hines of Norwalk, “Walsh is only a paper owner of . . . Fortune Investments and the Mustang club who receives a salary from the club.”

“Casino, the supposedly salaried manager of the club, makes heavy cash draws from the club so as to make it appear that there is little profit in the club beyond its salaries and has been gambling heavily with these funds,” the suit alleged.

Carroll, who described himself in court documents as “an intimate friend and business associate of Hines,” said he arranged for Hines to “assist . . . Walsh and James Casino in the capitalization of the Mustang Club by loaning $140,000” to Fortune Investments in 1982 and 1983.

“I have learned that the bulk of the cash receipts from the operation of the Mustang club are removed by Mr. Casino without maintenance of any records as to the amounts or their disposition,” Carroll said in a May 15, 1985, declaration filed in court.

By September, 1985, Fortune Investments Inc. had filed for federal bankruptcy protection. But “the tactical bankruptcy petition backfired when it appeared that a federal receiver was about to take over the club and monitor the actual cash flow and observe that Casino is the true owner,”Westreich said in a court declaration filed in March, 1986.

Under terms of the settlement, Hines agreed to drop her lawsuit and she and Carroll agreed not to pursue their claims against Fortune Investments in Bankruptcy Court.

In another lawsuit filed in 1983, Arizona resident Mark Remme alleged that Casino and Mark Hendrix formed and owned Fortune Investments Inc., which operated as the Mustang club.

Remme sued Fortune Investments, Casino, Walsh and Hendrix for fraud concerning alleged non-payment of a $20,000 loan. A stipulated $36,600 judgment against Fortune and the Mustang club was entered in favor of Remme on Aug. 1, 1983, and he dismissed his suit against each of the individuals on the same date, court records show.

Under terms of the loan, Remme was to receive 10% of the bar’s net income, the suit said. But Casino failed to pay and instead diverted the bar’s assets for his personal use, the suit said.

The lawsuit alleged that Fortune Investments was “a mere shell and sham” intended by Casino and Hendrix as a means to obtain a state liquor license and to “avoid individual liability by substituting a financially insolvent corporation in place . . . of themselves.”

In an apparent reference to the Cowboy Hotdog venture, Remme also alleged that Casino had “sought to purge (himself) of the taint of the previous bad business failure by setting up a corporate entity as a shell and a sham” with Walsh as president.

Silva said his former client was “basically an honest person,” but “because he was a promoter type there was a stigma that was always attached to him.”

He refused to describe Casino’s current business interests but said several times that “there’s going to be tremendous repercussions” in those businesses because of Casino’s death.

Silva added that he was deeply shocked by Casino’s death.

“He had raised himself up from hardship,” Silva said. “He had a couple of new Rolls-Royces and, once, a home in the Anaheim Hills. He always said, ‘Some day if I make it, I’m going to have a Rolls-Royce.’ ”

Times staff writers Jane Applegate and Steve Emmons contributed to this story.