Ciulla Is Held on Swiss Charges : Jurisprudence: Convicted race-fixer is accused of investment swindle.

Tony Ciulla, once described by racing authorities as “the most notorious race-fixer in the history of racing,” is in federal custody in Los Angeles, awaiting probable extradition to Switzerland next month to face federal charges there involving an alleged investment scam.

Ciulla was being held without bail Tuesday.

Ciulla, convicted three times of fixing races in the 1970s, was arrested four months ago by federal agents and local police at his $1-million home in Newport Beach. Swiss authorities have charged him in connection with an alleged swindle in which Ciulla is said to have extorted about $125,000 from an Italian woman. The scheme reportedly was not related to racing.

Ciulla, 48, now goes by the name of Anthony Capra, which he assumed when the federal witness protection program created a new identity in exchange for his cooperation in race-fixing investigations in several states. Race-fixers were convicted in New England, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Michigan, but in New York, where Ciulla said he fixed at least 50 races, using big-time jockeys as conspirators, most charges were never proved.

Jacinto Vasquez’s New York riding license was suspended for a year after he allegedly offered another jockey a bribe before a race at Saratoga. Vasquez, who still rides, has denied any association with Ciulla.

California racing investigators had been tipped off last summer by Newport Beach authorities that Ciulla might surface at Del Mar. An alert was put out, but Ciulla apparently never showed up at the track. Several years ago, a one-time conspirator of Ciulla’s, who was also a convicted race-fixer, was spotted by racing investigators at Santa Anita, which resulted in their learning that Ciulla had relocated to Malibu.

“Ciulla might not be going to tracks, but we have reason to believe that he was still betting heavily on horses prior to his arrest,” an FBI agent said Tuesday. The agent didn’t want his name used.

Asked during a phone interview with The Times a few years ago if he was still betting on horses, Ciulla said: “Let’s put it this way--I still maintain my library.”

Ciulla spent most of the 1980s in California, and while he was living in Malibu, his wife claimed a horse under the name of Helen Capra at Hollywood Park in 1983. Track stewards, upon learning that Helen Capra was Helen Ciulla, revoked her owner’s license.

Earlier that year, Helen Ciulla bought a 2-year-old at a California Thoroughbred Breeders Assn. auction, but the horse never raced for the Ciullas.

When the stewards told Helen Ciulla that her license had been voided, steward Pete Pedersen said her husband called him at Del Mar and said: “Do you think I need to own horses to fix races?”

Trial records show that most of the races Ciulla fixed were with horses he didn’t own. He usually bribed jockeys to keep several favored horses from winning and then bet heavily on the remaining horses in exactas and trifectas. Ciulla was said to have bribed jockeys with offers in the $800-$8,000 range, and he was also known to physically intimidate the riders.

Ciulla and his family filed a $30-million lawsuit against the Thoroughbred Racing Protective Bureau, claiming that the bureau’s handling of the licensing situation in California was an invasion of privacy and caused emotional distress. The suit was dismissed and the Ciullas also lost their appeal.

“We have no evidence that Ciulla has been connected with racing since that attempt in California,” said Paul Berube, president of the TRPB.