Jukebox Empire

An aspiring tycoon partners with a racketeer to build a jukebox that makes millions, then takes the fall for the largest money-laundering scheme in history.

By David Rabinovitch

Synopsis

Caught between the Mob and the feds in a plot to save the casinos in Havana from Castro’s revolution, Wolfe Rabin pulls the biggest money-laundering scheme in history, but his hubris leads to the conspiracy unraveling in a sensational trial. Rabin’s trajectory from inventor to promoter to outlaw is set against the Mob’s growing infiltration of the jukebox industry. In a world of music, machines, and money, popular culture and organized crime collide in an epic drama of invention and greed. David Rabinovitch’s investigation into his own family history pieces together an epic puzzle that begins in Chicago with the invention of a jukebox and spans the casinos of Havana and the financial giants of Europe, leading to what the FBI called “the biggest bank robbery in the world.”

David Rabinovitch

About The Author

With a background in investigative journalism, David Rabinovitch unearthed trial transcripts and classified documents to reveal the secrets of the Mob’s involvement with jukeboxes and the largest money laundering scheme in history. An EMMY, Peabody, and Gemini Award-winning film maker, he has filmed on five continents and screened his work for a committee of Congress. Jukebox Empire: The Mob and the Dark Side of the American Dream is his first book.

David hails from the town of Morden, Manitoba, where his uncle Wolfe Rabin’s exploits remain a subject of myth and lore. David and his wife, artist Marsha Karr, live in Mercer Island, Washington, and in the “pueblo magico” of Todos Santos, Mexico.

Awards & Recognitions

EMMY, Peabody, and Gemini Award-winning film maker

Politics of Poison

Endorsements

This is a brilliant depiction, in evocative prose, of the corrupt juke box industry as controlled by the mob. Anyone interested in how the mob can launder money through a seemingly innocent American pastime should read Jukebox Empire.
Jeffrey Sussman
Author of Sin City Gangsters, Boxing and the Mob, and Big Apple Gangsters
It reads like a novel, but the characters and events described by David Rabinovitch are real and chilling. Fans of The Untouchables and Godfather II will thank me for recommending Jukebox Empire.
Peter Edwards
Co-author of Bad Blood and The Encyclopedia of Canadian Organized Crime
A fast-paced, colorful romp through a slice of the twentieth century American underworld, Jukebox Empire has a cinematic quality, not surprising given its filmmaker author. A chilling tale of the path leading a talented son of Jewish immigrant parents in a remote town in Manitoba to the heights and depths of the American mob.
David Kertzer
Pulitzer Prize winner, author, The Kidnapping of Edgardo Mortara, The Pope at War, The Pope and Mussolini, The Popes against the Jews
David Rabinovitch has taken a family secret and turned it into an exciting, fast-moving story about his father’s brother, William “Wolfe” Rabin. Rabinovitch has molded this personal family history into a riveting chronicle that is part organized crime, part money laundering, and part jukebox history. Jukebox Empire is a tour-de-force account of the Mob’s growing infiltration into legitimate American industry and how it affected one man who was obsessed with power and money at all costs.
Joe Saltzman,
Professor of journalism, Anneberg School of Communication, University of Southern California

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Tablet Magazine

Read the full article My Uncle, the Crook by Allan Levine in Tablet Magazine. There’s a great animation at the top of the article!

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