McFeely: Crypto businessman ND once participated in Las Vegas ‘Century Trial’ – InForum

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FARGO – There’s enough in Rick Tabish’s story to make Martin Scorcese drool. Suspected murder, sex, drugs, money, a casino boss, the mafia, Las Vegas, a stripper. There are even buried treasures and silver bricks. Everything is here. All that’s missing is Joe Pesci playing Tabish.

It was juicy enough that the plot Tabish was embroiled in two decades ago had been the subject of at least six books and one movie — which didn’t involve Scorsese or Pesci. Tabish’s mess was highlighted in a “48 Hours” segment. There were at least a few documentaries and dozens of tabloid TV shows about it.

The Las Vegas Review-Journal called the trial in which Tabish and her lover Sandy Murphy were convicted of murdering Murphy’s boyfriend, drug-addicted and disgraced casino manager Ted Binion, the “trial of the century.”

Who is Rick Tabish and why should anyone in North Dakota care?

If you saw the photo distributed to statewide media this week, the one showing Gov. Doug Burgum talking to two cryptocurrency executives who are planning to build a huge data center near Williston, you would have seen Rick Tabish. He is president of Montana-based FX Solutions and one of the main leaders of the $1.9 billion project, according to Burgum, which will help diversify the economy of western North Dakota.

In 2000, Tabish and Murphy were convicted of murder in Binion’s 1998 death and sentenced to 20 years in prison.

The conviction was overturned in 2004 after an appeal to the Nevada Supreme Court, but Tabish’s convictions for burglary, conspiracy, extortion and other charges remained. He spent 10 years in prison before being released on parole in 2010.

Before meeting Murphy in Vegas and being hired by Binion to do odd jobs, Tabish was an unlucky businessman from Montana with a checkered past. A lengthy 1999 profile article about Tabish in his hometown newspaper, the Missoulian, painted a portrait of a young man from a wealthy family who often got into trouble with the law.

Tabish was a suspect in a series of burglaries and a rape case in the 1980s. ‘We investigated a number of cases at the time, but they just had a way of disappearing,’ a sheriff’s detective said the newspaper.

In 1987, Tabish was arrested for stealing an expensive painting from his lawyer and for dealing cocaine. While the drug case was ongoing, Tabish was accused of beating a restaurant patron and fracturing the man’s eye socket.

A judge sentenced Tabish to 10 years in Montana State Prison in the cocaine case, with a seven-year suspended sentence. Tabish only served nine months.

In 2019, Tabish operated a bitcoin mining operation in Butte that was owned by a man accused in a Ponzi scheme that defrauded investors of $722 million. Tabish sued Colorado man Matthew Goettsche to recover millions of his own money.

He is now a major player in Burgum’s vision to turn North Dakota into a tech powerhouse. The governor was aware of Tabish’s past troubles, according to an aide.

“Yes, we knew about Rick’s background, including his parole in 2010,” Burgum spokesman Mike Nowatzki said in a statement. “He has done business in North Dakota for over a decade without incident to our knowledge, including with a number of oil and gas companies.”

Indeed, it seems that most of Tabish’s indiscretions happened many years ago.

But the Las Vegas murder case is one that may never be forgotten in Sin City. He has been the subject of many columns, especially in newspaper and magazine articles available on the Internet.

Ted Binion was the son of an early Las Vegas casino owner, but he lost his gambling license due to ties to organized crime. Binion was addicted to hard drugs and made no attempt to get clean, regularly using black tar heroin.

“He sold bricks of cash and stored buried treasure,” the Review-Journal wrote, referring to the millions of cash Binion had buried under his sprawling Vegas property.

Binion’s girlfriend was Murphy, a young woman from California who went to Vegas on a whim to gamble and didn’t leave. She eventually became a stripper, dancing at a club Binion frequented. They became a couple, although Binion was called abusive.

Tabish landed in Vegas needing money for various business ventures. The Missoulian said Tabish was millions in debt, even though he described his businesses as “successful.” Tabish and Murphy met and became lovers. Tabish allegedly told the murder trial that he was in love with her.

Binion was found dead in his home at the age of 55 on September 17, 1998. His death was caused by an overdose of heroin and Xanax. But a medical examiner believed Binion had been murdered by suffocation, and a prosecutor believed “a mountain of circumstantial evidence” pointed to Tabish and Murphy.

Key evidence that led to the couple’s conviction included the strained relationship between Murphy and Binion, with Binion telling his attorney to remove Murphy from his will, and Tabish rushing Binion’s estate in an attempt to unearth around $6 million. in silver.

Tabish and Murphy were found guilty after eight days of jury deliberation. The trial was broadcast live by Court TV and attracted national media attention.

The Nevada Supreme Court granted a new appeal trial, saying there were flaws in the first. New attorneys for Murphy and Tabish cast enough doubt that Binison had been suffocated to secure an acquittal.

Murphy was released almost immediately in 2004 while Tabish served time for conspiracy to commit burglary and/or robbery, as well as grand larceny.

“I knew this was a circumstantial case. It’s what our justice system is for. I’m just complying with what the Supreme Court says,” said the district judge who oversaw the first trial, Joseph Bonaventure, to the Review-Journal for a 2018 story “I was reversed before this, I was reversed after this, and I’m sure I’ll be reversed again. I didn’t really of regrets about it. I just look at him and say, ‘Well, OK. The system works. Let’s do it again. We did it again. It was a different result. “

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