 ran mob accounts ( NY Daily News via Getty Images) He told how in the late 60s Ronnie travelled across the Atlantic for meetings with US mobster Meyer Lansky. Lansky was known as the 'mob's accountant' and became a key figure in the American underworld, helping to establish the National Crime Syndicate – a loose confederation of criminal organisations. James said: 'Ronnie went to America to meet the Mafia and see how they operated the casinos. Ronnie wanted to be part of that. He was very adventurous and ambitious. 'At first he travelled to Chicago to meet Meyer Lansky. He was the man with all the connections. While he was there he travelled to Vegas.' Frank Sinatra poses for a portrait in 1958 in Los Angeles ( Michael Ochs Archives) James said: 'While he was there he met Frank Sinatra. While they were talking Sinatra told him his son, Frank Sinatra Jr, was coming){kind=link}
Kray twin Ronnie went to Las Vegas in the late 1960s to join forces with the Mafia and was shown a basement where there was a huge metal cage with tigers in it – and blood on the floor…
Ronnie Kray visited a Mafia boss’s Las Vegas mansion â complete with a tiger cage in the basement where rivals of the mob were “disposed of”.
The notorious East End gangster travelled to the States in the late 1960s to see how the Mafia operated its casinos, a former pal has revealed.
The Krays hoped to form a partnership with the American mob and expand their criminal empire, setting up a string of similar casinos around London and the UK.
Ronnie and twin brother Reggie dominated London’s underworld for 20 years in the 1950s and 60s after forming their gang, The Firm.