Castro Assassination Plot of 1959
Fidel Castro used Frank Sturgis to obtain information on the criminal activities and records of several American organized crime members, which Sturgis obtained through contacts within US law enforcement. Sturgis, at the time Castro’s Air Force Director of Security and de facto gambling supervisor, soon changed sides, despite having participated in mass executions of Castro’s enemies and serving as a guerrilla warfare trainer.
After being approached by Meyer Lansky, who indicated he and his gambling cohorts would pay to have Castro killed, Sturgis derived a plan to assassinate the Cuban leader during a visit to New York to address the United Nations in 1959. While Castro was in New York, registered at the Statler Hilton Hotel, Sturgis registered at the same time under his original name of Frank Fiorini. While staying at the hotel Sturgis was approached by a representative of the Havana Mafia gambling interests. Sturgis/Fiorini was offered $100,000 to kill Castro while he was in the hotel.
Sturgis, noting that the amount offered was considerably less than the amount referenced by Lansky, declined. When he returned to Havana several days later he reported the offer to CIA contacts at the still open US Embassy there. The CIA recognized that the gangsters and the US government shared a mutual interest in removing Castro, and selected known smuggler Norman Rothman as the liaison between the CIA and the Mafia. Rothman would serve as the communication pipeline between the mob and the CIA while continuing to run guns to Castro.
It quickly became evident that killing Castro on US soil would be counterproductive, if not impossible, and various means of using Mafia hitmen to reach Castro, as well as his brother Raul, were discussed. Sam Giancana and Santos Trafficante both provided contracted hitmen to CIA personnel. Several CIA operatives involved were not full-time employees of the agency but outside contractors serving as consultants, including Sturgis, E. Howard Hunt, and others.
Despite several attempts to launch a successful assassination of Castro during the Eisenhower administration, neither the Mafia nor the CIA was able to execute the Cuban leader. Trafficante associate and known enforcer Johnny Roselli volunteered to lead an execution squad to Cuba, using Mafia enforcers he personally selected, funded by the CIA, which would also provide arms and transportation. By the time of the Kennedy inauguration in January 1961, 38 separate attempts to murder Castro had been initiated by the CIA and at least two dozen included the use of operatives with known ties to organized crime.