HARRISBURG - Governor Edward G. Rendell is smarting over the flap caused by his administration's failure to do a rudimentary check into the background of the new head of the state Gaming Control Board, Alphonse Gabriel Capone, also known as "Scarface," "boss" and "kingpin." When the Rendell administration picked Capone, who donated in excess of $600,000 to Rendell's reelection bid, it failed to ask him if he had a criminal record. In fact, Capone has been linked to gangland killings and has been convicted in connection with illegal alcohol trafficking and bribes of government officials.
Capone, reached at his cell at the Alcatraz Federal Penitentiary, said the allegations were "more of the same." He deferred further questions to his associate and vice-chair of the Gaming Control Board, gangster Frank Nitti.
Rendell told reporters he was not concerned about Capone's failure to make full disclosure. "Oh, I can't get excited about that; this is another Republican witch hunt," Rendell said. "I mean, the way you guys [the press] twist things, it's understandable that accomplished people like Al [Capone] don't want reveal every single incident, no matter how innocuous, from their past," Rendell said.
Lt. Governor Catherine Baker Knoll, who is prone to referring to Governor Edward G. Rendell as "Edward G. Robinson," the late tough-guy actor who played mobsters in the movies, told reporters that "now Pennsylvania has two gangsters in high places, the Governor and Scarface."
