The Murder of Sonny Liston: Las Vegas, Heroin, and Heavyweights

by Shaun Assael

A re-examination of the circumstances surrounding former heavyweight champion Sonny Liston's death in Las Vegas in 1970.

Genres: Nonfiction, Sports, True Crime, Biography, Crime, History, Drugs

320 pages, Hardcover

First published February 9, 2016

Reviews

[J. Kent Messum · Rating 4 out of 5]

*Review originally published in the New York Journal Of Books: http://www.nyjournalofbooks.com/book-...

Charles “Sonny” Liston, former heavyweight champion turned drug dealer, was found dead in his Las Vegas home on January 5, 1971. It was the ending of a life that had been steadily veering toward rock bottom. He wasn’t quite celebrated or beloved enough for the public to view it as a tragedy. A suspected heroin overdose was nullified with an official death from the coroner listed as “natural causes.”

At the time there were quite a few questions surrounding the passing of Liston. Over the years many more have arisen. Was his case handled properly? What happened to him in the days and months leading up to his death? And, most importantly, was Sonny Liston murdered?

Author Shaun Assael wades into Liston’s world with a hawk’s eye and the nose of bloodhound. 'The Murder of Sonny Liston' is many things: a biography, a story of sixties Las Vegas, and an investigation into a suspicious death that was never conducted. Despite being nonfiction, The Murder of Sonny Liston tells a good story. It reads like an exemplary bit of hard-boiled crime fiction at times, keeping you glued to the pages. Shaun doesn’t sugarcoat. He’s writing in a heavyweight class and hits hard. You feel thumped by some of this book, grim realities and seedy fantasies coming together in a revelation of Las Vegas that is as ugly as it is glamorous.

Vegas has always been a town in various stages of transition, for better or worse. The sixties were in many ways pivotal for its future, a decade that saw much violence, disparity, and change. Going about his business during all of this was Liston, a boxer with the biggest hands in the sport. Often billed before fights as a black-hearted beast rather than a hero, Sonny was neither. He had a poor start in life, little education, and relied on his God given gifts of strength and pugilism. A merciless media often made Liston out to be a simpleton when, in fact, he was far more complex than many would give him credit for. His emotions could be as voracious as his appetites. Both got him into a lot of trouble.

“All that Sonny had was his reputation as a thug who stumbled into a championship and didn’t know what to do with it once he got it. . . . He couldn’t defend himself with speeches because he hated public speaking. And he couldn’t charm his way through tough spots because he couldn’t be charming. . . . The easiest and most natural reaction was for him to become surly and suspicious.”

While reading 'The Murder of Sonny Liston' one feels sympathy and disapproval for the aging boxer in almost equal amounts. Liston was a husband who tried, but not hard enough. He was a father who loved kids, but had considerable trouble raising his own. He was an incredible athlete as well as a junkie, gambler, and philanderer. After his glory days and the controversies that followed, the former boxing champ was gradually reduced to a drug dealing has-been celebrity for tourists flocking to The Strip. The book serves as a powerful exposé of the hard-knock lives lived in that town during that time period—the racial divide, the trouble with narcotics and crime, the money gambled away leaving dashed dreams and broken folks in its wake. It’s a side of Vegas rarely seen, let alone investigated.

In order to set the time and place Assael focuses on much more than Sonny Liston. Muhammad Ali, Howard Hughes, Joe Louis, and Kirk Kerkorian (to name a few) all get ample airtime. Their stories are all fascinating, but sometimes it feels as if they stray too far from the case at hand. Whenever Assael goes out of his way with these characters, you can’t help but get the niggling feeling that there might not be enough to the whole Sonny Liston “murder” to fill a book. The distractions are welcome enough, though it feels lukewarm when you wonder if these digressions have diverted you in order to help increase the final word count.

Also, Assael raises a lot of interesting questions about a possible murder scenario, but doesn’t conclusively answer many of them. However, the speculation and circumstantial evidence alone is more than enough to raise a few eyebrows. There were numerable vicious bottom-feeding characters that Liston kept company with who eventually had an interest in seeing him gone. The Las Vegas Police Department played by their own rules with law and order, and they had Liston on their radar for some time, too. Politicians, organized crime, and wealthy tycoons all had their own agendas in Sin City, and in a small way Sonny was often only one or two degrees separated from it. Dirty money was to be made, corruption was widespread, and victims were acceptable collateral damage.

Like many others, Sonny soon found himself out of his depth in Las Vegas, a depth that often drowned most men. Very few writers can close the book on a cold case, and this one is no different. It’s the open case that in turn opens our imaginations. 'The Murder of Sonny Liston' is a fitting send-off for a man who regularly received the wrong (or lack of) attention in both life and death. Assael does him justice, painting a portrait of a complicated man whose bad circumstances often led him to make even worse decisions.

“After a lifetime of beatings from the press and public, Sonny was profoundly insecure. He was so insecure, in fact, that he fell back on the only thing besides boxing that he’d ever done well: crime. But let’s be honest. He also got plenty of breaks along the way. As much as he was harassed early in his career, he was coddled later in it. The Vegas cops cut him more breaks than he had a right to expect. The only thing they didn’t give him was a homicide investigation.”

Despite living a pinball existence in Sin City, Liston was a deserving man. A proper inquest into his death was what he deserved most of all. Going into the book, it would be advantageous to know it really isn’t predominantly about the former boxing champ. 'The Murder of Sonny Liston' in many parts plays second fiddle to 'Las Vegas, Heroin, and Heavyweights'. Assael’s investigation frequently wanders from the path leading to one particular man’s demise, but does so in the best possible ways.

[Erin · Rating 2 out of 5]

I had never heard of Sonny Liston before reading this book. I had to ask my dad who he was & since my dad was a just kid when Liston was fighting he only knew one thing about Liston. My grandfather had told him that Sonny Liston had been paid by the mob lose a fight to Muhammad Ali.

Sonny Liston was illiterate, mean, a drug addict, a womanizer, and a criminal. That's all this book tells you about him. Liston died of heroin overdose because Liston was a heroin addict. This book wants you to think that a huge shadowy conspiracy killed him but it provides no evidence. This book was really about the dirty cops who ran Las Vegas in the 60's. I don't really recommend this book if you are interested in Sonny Liston but if you want know about dirty cops this is you're book.

[Joseph Hirsch · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Laura Palmer of the Fight Game (Sonny was born dead)

The subtitle of this book says it all. This is not a book about Sonny Liston; it's a book about the seedy Vegas milieu where Sonny settled after his boxing career ended in ignominy. And even though the book is titled "The Murder of Sonny Liston" one should not expect the kind of revelations from this book that came with "I Heard You Paint Houses," the book about the murder of Jimmy Hoffa. After I read that book, I was pretty sure Frank Sheeran was telling the truth when he gave his theory of who murdered the infamous AFL-CIO boss. Shaun Assael (the author of this book) meanwhile floats and pops a good number of balloons, and he does a good job of beating feet and asking questions himself to try to answer the million dollar question: Did someone give Charles "Sonny" Liston a hotshot either because he had debts with them, or they owed him money and didn't want to pay? Liston, after all, was rumored to own a piece of all of Muhammad Ali's future earnings after he allegedly took a dive from a "phantom punch" in their rematch.

No questions are conclusively answered in this book, since most of the people who took part in the life of the Vegas Strip during the time in question are either dead, not talking, or talking in riddles. But that's okay. The author does a solid job of recreating the mood of a town where mobsters rubbed elbows with famous crooners, where cops sold more heroin than drug dealers, and a former heavyweight champion of the world spent his nights chasing dope, cocktail waitresses, and trouble.

The book isn't primarily about boxing, obviously, since it deals with the twilight of Liston's career, but in those patches where Assael describes fights, he proves himself to be a top flight sports writer. It goes without saying that, in addition to being a mystery, this book is also a tragedy. Boxing is a sport where men punch each other for a living, and try to inflict maximum harm, so it's naturally got more than its fair share of tragic lore. That Sonny Liston was its most tragic figure doesn't need reiterating. That he is also the sport's greatest enigma-still-after all these years, makes the book worth reading. Recommended.

[Leew49 · Rating 1 out of 5]

A generation before George Foreman, Sonny Liston was the biggest, meanest, most fearsome heavyweight in boxing. In an era when the heavyweight championship was still looked upon as having national significance, if only symbolically, Liston's criminal background and alleged mob ties made even the idea of him fighting for the title a matter of heated debate. But for years he was the most obviously deserving challenger. And when Floyd Patterson, the reigning champion, finally gave him a title shot, the result was a one-sided beating that was more like an alley mugging than a championship fight. Liston won the title, defended it just as one-sidedly against Patterson a few years later, and looked unbeatable.

Then a loudmouthed kid, then called Cassius Clay, took the title from Liston in one of the biggest upsets in boxing history. And a few months later KO'd Liston with the notorious "phantom punch" in what remains to this day a controversial fight. Did the imposing Liston take a dive in the second fight, after being promised a percentage of Clay/Ali's future earnings? This speculation, with no obvious money trail, is part of the author's argument for foul play in Liston's death years later by apparent heroin overdose.

Assael presents the reader with numerous theories for the alleged murder of Liston, most of them based on interviews conducted years later. Most of the evidence is only hearsay or hearsay once removed, an investigational style that could be characterized as "he said that he said." At one point the author even quotes an anonymous statement on an Internet message board, arguing that it is remarkably detailed and would, if true, answer several important questions about Liston's death.

There are, I think, three questions asked by this book, none of them satisfactorily answered: 1. Was Liston murdered? 2. If so, who did it? 3. What was the motive?

The argument for a murder vs accidental overdose rests to a large extent on what appears from the vantage point of more than four decades to have been an incomplete or even incompetent police investigation following Liston's death. The difficulty was increased by a span of several days between Liston's death and the discovery of his body by his wife Geraldine. Several motives are suggested: the aforementioned and purely speculative financial arrangement with Ali or Ali's handlers, Liston's potential value as a witness against the Las Vegas underworld, and a grudge against Liston by a particular drug dealer based on Liston's early release following a police raid. As to the identity of his alleged killer, a whole chorus line of drug dealers, crooked cops and police snitches, most of them long dead themselves, is offered for our consideration.

No clear evidence emerges from any of this discussion. The author was thorough and, from anything this reader can tell, seriously motivated to solve this decades-old mystery. But so much time has passed, and so much of the argument depends on witnesses who can most generously described as unreliable, that after 288 ages, I would suggest that the book's title should end with a question mark.

The murder of Sonny Liston? More than likely, we will never know.

[Leslie · Rating 2 out of 5]

The author, in trying to prove Liston was murdered, makes it obvious he wasn’t. The 45 year-old evidence is along the lines of “he said that he said”. The medical reports confirm that it wasn’t even a heroin overdose, as most people think. It was “myocardial anoxia or poor oxygen supply to heart muscles and a coronary insufficiency or insufficient supply of nutrient blood to the heart muscles.”

The most interesting part of the story was a few pages on the 1965 “fight” with Cassius Clay in Lewiston, Maine. Long suspected of a fix, the author agrees that it was, but provides little in the way of incriminating details.

[Hewitt Moore · Rating 2 out of 5]

The title is misleading. The author doesn't offer any evidence that Liston's heroin overdose was murder. But the book did provide some interesting background on Liston, Vegas, Ali, boxing, etc, that made the book worth reading.

[Harold Kasselman · Rating 4 out of 5]

CAUTION: MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS
I listened to the audio version of the book. I listened to it on my way from NJ to Florida, and I was totally engrossed. It is worthy of a 4.5 rating. The author obviously did a yeoman's job in his investigation and research. I give him a lot of credit for his work ethic on a case that was closed in 1970-71. Notwithstanding his research and interviews of key players, I was unconvinced that Liston was murdered. The author proffers several barely plausible theories for why many people wanted Liston dead. The shared motive was that Liston knew too much about drug dealing, police corruption, or maybe even a fix of the Liston/Clay(Ali) fights. The author suggests the following list of suspects: a former rogue detective from the Las Vegas police department, or an informant and accomplice of the detective, a local drug dealer who may have been fingered by Liston, Ash Resnick a former big time gaming player in Vegas, an ex- girl friend,and even someone at the behest of the Nation of Islam. You need to read the book to find out why they all had some thread of a motive. The problem is that the motives are a reach and the evidence is even more speculative and thin. What is more disturbing is the lack of proof to even suspect a homicide rather than death by natural causes. I remain unconvinced that the coroner or medical examiner based his findings on insufficient evidence and on a flimsy medical theory of pulmonary causation. I'm not a physician or pathologist but I didn't find much to suggest a murder. That Liston was murdered is essentially the ravings of a deceased chronic alcoholic with a motive to fabricate. The other theory that Liston was a problem for Resnick or the Nation of Islam for making waves about the alleged fix of the Clay fights, while fascinating, does not rise above the level of even a hunch.
But what makes this a very enjoyable read is that it is a period piece. Any book that can incorporate Frank Sinatra, Sammy Davis, Ralph Lamb, J Edgar Hoover, Jimmy Ellis, Leotis Martin, Joe Frazier, Jerry Quarry, Kirk Kerkorian, Richard Nixon, Spiro Agnew, John Mitchell, and Howard Hughes into a narrative is worth your time and money. The book captures the old Vegas and its transformation into the mecca of thrill seekers that it has become. Each and everyone of these interesting cast of characters has a small role in the development of the culture of those 60's and 70's. And the author builds his case with the help of this cultural foundation that he develops in a fascinating story that shaped the life of Liston, and according to the author, the death of Liston as well. You will also get to know Liston as "a man"(written on his grave stone). With a few exceptions, it's not a pretty picture. But if he were murdered as is suggested, he deserved a full investigation. You will have to decide whether the facts warranted it then or now. Well done Mr. Assael but I cannot conclude that he was murdered much less by whom.










Reading Progress

[kcfan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I received a digital copy of this book through Penguin's First to Read program in exchange for an honest review. I didn't know anything about boxing prior to reading this book, but I still enjoyed the book. The author did a good job of spinning the mystery and the background information that led up to it. The description of Vegas during that time period was also really interesting. Some chapters seemed to ramble off on a different tangent, but there was a reason for that information and it all came together. Good read!

[Quirkyreader · Rating 4 out of 5]

I received this book as an ARC from Penguin. It is a good piece of cross genre non-fiction. It combines True Crime and Sport. I am not a big Sport of Boxing fan. But for those who are or are just getting into Boxing this will be a very enjoyable read.

What I enjoyed most about this book was the history of Las Vegas and how the policing of the city has changed over the years.

[Bob D'Angelo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Here is the link to my review on my website, The Sports Bookie. Posted Oct. 18, 2016:

http://bobdangelobooks.weebly.com/the...

And here is what I wrote:

It reads like a script from the old television show “Cold Case.”

A former heavyweight boxing champion is found dead from an apparent heroin overdose. Undertones of organized crime and racial tension rage in Las Vegas. A police informant points a finger at rogue policeman, then is found dead under mysterious circumstances years later. Maneuvering, wrangling and jealousy between the area’s two biggest law enforcement agencies run rampant.

Charles “Sonny” Liston’s death in January 1971 has been chalked up to that accidental overdose. But in The Murder of Sonny Liston: Las Vegas, Heroin, and Heavyweights (Blue Rider Press; hardback; $27; 304 pages), author and investigative journalist Shaun Assael advances a more sinister theory. Liston, he asserts, was forcibly injected with an overdose of heroin.

“Can you tell me what happened to you, Sonny?” Liston’s widow, Geraldine shouted at his funeral.

That’s the question Assael attempts to answer. He builds his narrative slowly, step by step, taking the reader into the culture that Liston had thrived in during the late 1960s. There are so many seedy characters in this book, it would be easy to point the finger at a number of people — and Assael explores each “suspect” in detail.

But any mystery has a beginning, and Liston lived a hard life from the start. Born in Forrest City, Arkansas, and one of the 25 children fathered by a sharecropper named Tobe Liston — “a miserable miscreant of a man” — Sonny ran afoul of the law as a youth after his mother moved the family to St. Louis in the mid-1940s. He was introduced to boxing by a prison chaplain who was impressed by Liston’s fearsome jab, a left-handed punch that trainer Angelo Dundee compared to “getting hit by a telephone pole.”

But even though Liston had the biggest fists in boxing history, “his fate would always be in someone else’s hands.” Liston won the heavyweight title with a crushing knockout of Floyd Patterson in the first round of their 1962 bout and did the same in the return bout a year later. He lost the title to Cassius Clay (who would become Muhammad Ali) in February 1964, and in the May 1965 rematch at Lewiston, Maine, Liston was knocked out in the first round by what some observers called a “phantom punch.”

Assael writes about a “secret percent theory,” where Liston would receive a cut of Ali’s future earnings in exchange for him taking a dive in the rematch. It was plausible; Liston could settle into semi-retirement and still live a good life on the strength of Ali’s success. But nobody could anticipate Ali’s future controversy over his refusal to be inducted into the military.

Assael writes that Liston’s head told him to stay in his suburban Vegas home and keep his wife happy, but “his heart kept leading him to the boozy, shiftless soul” of the Las Vegas ghetto. He became an enforcer for a drug dealer named Robert Chudnick — also known as jazz musician Red Rodney. In February 1969, Liston was the only person released when police raided and arrested everyone in the home of a beautician/drug dealer named Earl Cage. Chudnick and others in the drug business began to view Liston with distrust, believing he might be a police informant. Apparently, Gage thought so, too.

Liston’s death in 1971 didn’t have the earmarks of a murder. The autopsy was inconclusive, and news reports at the time played up Liston’s descent into drug addiction. Death by overdose seemed to be a natural progression.

But in 1982, a police informant named Irwin Peters claimed that former Vegas cop Larry Gandy had killed Liston. Gandy had been a legend among Las Vegas law enforcement workers, setting up more than 100 drug dealers, gaining their confidence by “shooting up” heroin with them. But Gandy had substituted gel caps filled with maple syrup and swapped them with the real stuff.

He had been fired for insubordination and turned crook, and eventually would be sentenced to 10 years in jail. The sentence was suspended.

Peters, by the way, received an ominous postcard with a picture of a desert and a threat: “This is where you’ll be.” Peters would be found dead in his garage in 1987, his car engine running.

Gandy proved why he was a legend, taking the initiative when Assael knocked at his door.

“Gandy wrapped his thick arm around me and said, ‘So, you’ve come to ask me if I killed Sonny Liston,’” Assael writes.

Assael said Gandy then kept him “spellbound” for the next two hours as he talked about his career and the crimes he later committed. He pointed to Gage as the man who killed Liston.

“As Gandy leaned backward, calm as could be, it suddenly struck me that this was the reason he had invited me into his home,” Assael wrote. “He’d spent the last thirty years trying to outrun Irwin Peters’ allegations.

“Now, while he had a chance, he wanted to offer up his own suspect. A dead beautician.” (Gage died in 2000).

The Murder of Sonny Liston offers up plenty of theories, and Assael is thorough as he sifts through them. In the end, however, Assael is unable to prove anything.

“I believe that finding the killer of Irwin Peters will unravel the real story of what happened to Sonny Liston,” he writes.

That may never happen. But Assael has pulled back the glamorous veneer of Las Vegas to reveal its sordid, seamier side. It’s a fascinating read.

[Michael Jordan · Rating 4 out of 5]

As a long time boxing fan, I enjoyed the book for the insight it provided into the troubled life of Sonny Liston and the seedy underbelly of Las Vegas at the time. While I remain unconvinced that the ex-champ was murdered, the investigation was, to say the least, incomplete and it is more than fair to question what really occurred. A highlight of the book is the depiction of various true life characters, particularly some of the cops who held sway in Vegas back in the day. Indeed, truth is stranger and you can't make this stuff up!

All in all, an enjoyable read for anyone interested in the dark side of Las Vegas and the ultimately disastrous life of the one time "baddest man on the planet."

[Royston Of Book Odyssey · Rating 2 out of 5]

Good book but if there is such a thing of bookbait, then this is what this book is. I didn't enjoy the deviation from the main character, but in the end no one really knows if he was murdered, or took an overdose.

[Jake Watt · Rating 3 out of 5]

Sonny Liston was a fascinating figure - I’m a huge nerd for boxing history - but Shaun Assael’s faux hardboiled, James Ellroy-lite writing style frequently had me rolling.

Examples:

Page 2, the reader’s introduction to Sonny Liston: “So much methane has escaped up his legs that his penis was fully engorged and his testicles were the size of pool balls”.

Page 23, on Sonny’s dad: “The only reason he even expended any sperm on Sonny, his twenty-fourth child in total and ninth by his second wife, Helen, was that he needed another hand to work his peanut fields”.

[Brendan Crowley · Rating 3 out of 5]

“As time passed, Sonny stayed in the conversation but not as an icon on his own. Eventually he became part of other people’s stories. He was the springboard for Ali, the model for Foreman, the guy who always scared (but not faced) Frazier”

Charles “Sonny” Liston was the 25th of 26 kids who grew up with no birth cert and no prospects. Boxing became his escape, albeit temporarily, from a life of crime that saw him serve time in prison for assaulting a cop. His career was dominated by mob control and overshadowed almost entirely by the emergence of Ali, Foreman and Frazier.

Liston is best know for two things – quitting on his chair in Ali-Liston 1, and being the guy on the canvas in the iconic photo of Ali from Ali-Liston 2. A life defined by defeats rather than the tale of a desperately poor, illiterate kid who became World Champion. A life defined by where he fits in the narrative of other, better remembered figures.

I was fascinated by Liston from the first time I saw the classic photo. I grew more interested when I first read the wonderful King of the World by David Remnick. It led me to Night Train by Nick Tosches which I adored as a teenager for its dark moodiness (whether it holds up particularly well, I’m eager to find out).

Recently published, The Murder of Sonny Liston is part sports book, part true crime, part conspiracy theory. It looks back at Liston’s life primarily through the time and place – Las Vegas in the early 1970s – of his final few years and the (potential) mystery surrounding his death. Las Vegas is as much the central character as Liston is and the two seem perfect for each other. Assael paints a picture of the various low level mobsters and the even more intriguing cops who tried to either stop them or join them. The book, partiularly the first third, oozes noir – the setting is dark, gritty with the smell of booze, sex and drugs almost wafting through the pages.

This is a mini biography of Liston with a bit about his childhood and more of a focus on the later years of his career – particularly post his fights with Ali. Reading this book without the Liston backstory might leave you a little short as to where he fits in to American life at the time. Assael covers the key points – his lack of a birth cert, his poor education, his status as the ‘bad guy’ morphing into the ‘not as bad as Ali guy” (for white America at least) “trouble-making black man”. Liston’s mob connections are touched on but the book doesn’t get into detail on how Liston, and much of boxing, ended up controlled by mob.

This picture of Liston’s later years is depressing. Yet in some ways, Liston had it better than many of his fellow retired prizefighters did. He had a nice house, a wife who tolerated his misdeeds, and he appeared to still have his faculties. He undoubtedly was cheated out of plenty of money, but he didn’t become a shambling wreck despite continuing to fight until he was nearly (probably) 50.

Overall, The Murder of Sonny Liston, is an enjoyable and entertaining read which loses is way in the final third. It works better when its about Liston and Vegas than when its about The Murder. There is more on Ali’s return to boxing post suspension than there needs to be, but its always entertaining to read about Ali.

Ultimately the book becomes more crime than sports orientated. As suggested by the title, it becomes more about a death than about a life. The speculation mounts as to whether Liston was actually murdered rather than died of natural causes. Assael builds an interesting but not totally convincing case and lays out the prime suspects. There is no ‘aha’ moment, no realisation of overlooked evidence. Just the grim reality that Liston appeared on an inevitable path towards a dark ending.

Some of the conspiracy theories are probably too readily accepted – I just don’t believe the Nation of Islam promised Liston a cut of Ali’s future fights if he threw their second bout.

By the end of the book, its hard not to feel that Assael is more interested in the cops and drug dealer tales from 70’s Vegas than he ever is in Sonny Liston. Even in a book about his death, Liston still becomes simply a part of other people’s stories.

See all of my sports book reviews at https://allsportsbooks.reviews

[Lance · Rating 4 out of 5]

Charles “Sonny” Liston lived a mysterious life, whether it was when he was born but could not produce a birth certificate, his young adulthood when he was imprisoned, when he was rising through the ranks of boxing to become the heavyweight champion, when he lost to Muhammad Ali twice (with the second fight ending by some accounts due to a phantom punch) and later in his post-boxing life in Las Vegas. When he was found dead in his apartment by his wife Geraldine on January 5, 1971 the medical examiner declared Liston’s death to be due to “natural causes.”

This book by investigative journalist Shawn Assael casts doubts on this diagnosis and raises the question of whether the former champion was forced to overdose on heroin that led to his death. In order to ask this question (Assael does not come to a definite conclusion that Liston was murdered), he writes a significant backstory about Las Vegas and the culture of the town at that time – mainly the drug, entertainment and criminal elements. Even if the reader doesn’t care at all about Liston, boxing or sports, he or she will be fascinated with the detailed description of “Sin City” in that time period.

If one wants to read this to find out just who would want a former heavyweight champion dead, there is plenty of candidates for that as well. The theories floated about in the book include thoughts that Liston knew too much about a) the drug dealers in Las Vegas, b) crooked police officers, or c) fixed fights, including his own in the second loss to Ali. The list of suspects the author offers up is extensive as well, as he names these possibilities: An ex-girlfriend, a gaming player in Las Vegas named Ash Resnick, a rogue cop from the Las Vegas Police department, an informant and accomplice of said cop and even someone from the Nation of Islam. There is even a “secret percent theory” told in which Liston would receive a portion of the receipts from all of Ali’s future bouts. While the evidence that Assael has on each one makes for great reading, not one of these theories convince readers or even the author himself that they are definitive proof that Liston was murdered.

So while this may generate as many questions as it answers, this book is one of the more entertaining books about the time and the sport of boxing that I have read. There is a decent amount of text about Liston’s fights as well. The quality of that writing shows that Assael not only can write about 1960’s Las Vegas and the culture, but can also cover the action inside a boxing ring quite well. This book is recommended for readers who want to learn more about Liston or Las Vegas in that era.

I wish to thank Blue Rider Press for providing a copy of the book via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

http://sportsbookguy.blogspot.com/201...

[Simon Zohhadi · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's 2.40 a.m. Just finished reading The Murder Of Sonny Liston. It's an interesting read for reasons, other than the central claim in the book, that Liston was killed; the author does not get close to proving that Sonny Liston was murdered. The original verdict was that the former Heavyweight Champion of the World died of natural causes and although he was a regular taker of drugs, there was not enough drugs in his body to cause the death. In my view, that is more likely to be the truth. Although, it is alleged he mixed with shady criminals, some of whom may have had reasons to kill Sonny, the evidence linking any of them with his death is almost non-existent. The author obviously takes a different view and others maybe convinced by his claims. The recurring suspicions about the integrity of his two fights against Ali have always been around but in my opinion Sonny just could not cope with the speed of his opponent or his "crazy" behaviour before both fights. I think Sonny was quite simply outpsyched and outboxed by The Greatest and these are the real reasons why he did not want to continue. Remember when the brilliant Roberto Duran was outpsyched by Sugar Ray Leonard. I believe it was the same cause for Listons defeats. I view Liston as one of the most fearsome Heavyweight Champions of all-time who just happened to lose twice to the greatest boxer of them all and then "partied" too hard, leading to his premature death. Despite all this, the book is still an entertaining account of Liston, Ali, Las Vegas and rumours about corruption and suspicious deaths.

[Erin Cataldi · Rating 4 out of 5]

Admittedly I knew next to nothing about Sonny Liston before I read this book. I'm not much of a sports guru, although I do love boxing movies. All I knew about Sonny Liston was that he was the fallen boxer in the famous photo with Muhammad Ali towering over him. That's it. While this book doesn't go into too much detail about Sonny's early life or early career, it does mention some key facts and picks up the story towards the end of Sonny's life and career. This book doesn't paint a pretty picture of anyone but it is a fascinating look at corruption, the mob, heroin, and Las Vegas. The author meticulously puts together all the possible events, people, and circumstances that point to the famous boxer being murdered, even though there was never a homicide investigation. The plot thickens when you realize that virtually no one was straight, not even his wife. While there is no concrete conclusion at the end, readers will draw their own conclusions and in the process learn a great deal about boxing, fight fixing, draft dodgers, heroin, dirty cops, and Las Vegas. Thoroughly engaging, I wish there had been more pictures, but hey, what is a little outside research on my own.

[Ellison · Rating 3 out of 5]

The title causes the reader to feel that 'The Truth is Out There'. Feels like a rehash of the movie "Phantom Punch' as it recounts Liston's life in a scattershot manner. At times feels padded as it mentions Sinatra, Howard Hughes, and Joe Louis. Mentions that Liston may have been promised a percent of Ali's future earnings if he took a dive. When Ali and Frazer plan to fight for big $ Liston ends up (conveniently) dead. Swearing.

[Ashwin · Rating 1 out of 5]

The more I read along, the more I wondered what the writer was hoping to achieve with this book. There are little tidbits on Sonny Liston, some on organised crime, some on law enforcement, some on politics. None of these topics are thoroughly investigated, though. The topics that eventually were covered in-depth were completely unnecessary to the core subject matter. Ultimately I was left feeling irritated and dissatisfied because no answers were given to any burning questions.

[Redpoet · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not much. Nothing new here. Nothing to see here. The basic conclusion of the book is, "who knows."

Not a colorful history of Vegas, not a treatise in racism. Not much. Maybe if you never heard of Sonny Liston, you would have, at least learned that he had a sad life, a raw deal, and was taken advantage by a bunch of white promoters and fight people. However, I did already know all that.

[Brandon Hodges · Rating 1 out of 5]

If you are a boxer, boxing historian, and or interested in Sonny Liston at all then this book isn't for you. The arguments for murder are weak and all circumstantial or hearsay and you hardly get insight on Liston other than the author trying to paint him as a thug. Boring and disgraceful.

[RICK "SHAQ" GOLDSTEIN · Rating 5 out of 5]

RICK “SHAQ” GOLDSTEIN SAYS: “YOU DIDN’T HAVE TO TAKE A DIVE IN 1965… TO ENJOY THIS BOXING WHODUNIT!”
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One-time Heavyweight Boxing Champion Sonny Liston’s… life… and.. death… along with his entire life story… fits the formula of every old-time boxing movie ever made… and then some. From being born without a birth certificate… and one of twenty-five children… in Arkansas… to serving hard time in prison… being a strong arm for the mob… altercations with cops… and being controlled by the mob for most of his fighting career… which at its peak led to the Heavyweight Championship… all the way to his death in Las Vegas… supposedly… by shooting up with heroin… though everybody who knew him… knew he was scared to death of needles.

Forty-five years after his death… there are still unanswered questions… not only about his death… but his life. Did he take a dive in the famous Lewiston, Maine “Phantom Punch” bout against Muhammad Ali… and other fights? Was he promised a cut of every subsequent Ali fight by The Nation of Islam? Was Sonny going to become a star witness for the government regarding all things bad in boxing… gambling…. Vegas… and who knows what else?

The author Shaun Assael does an unbelievable job… not only as an author… but as a top-notch detective. I was a teenager during the height of Liston’s championship run… and even went to see him workout in person at the Main Street Gym in Los Angeles… and yes… seeing Sonny skip rope to the beat of “Night Train”… was an impressive sight. I also got to personally see “and hear”… Sonny literally murdering heavy bags and speed bags… without an arrest being made. To this day… one memory above all… from my in person visit to Sonny’s workout was… I had never seen any muscular arms like his… that didn’t seem to get any smaller at his wrists! The author throughout this hypnotic tale… includes such pearls as… stating that Liston had the biggest fists in boxing history.

No stone is left unturned in following Liston’s life… and the literal… potential… domino effect of Liston’s life in the ring… and in his mob controlled… mob influenced life. From bookies… to Mafia strong men… to Howard Hughes… yes… to Howard Hughes… and even Frank Sinatra… punching out… AND… being punched out. The reader is taken by the hand… not only down the streets and alleys of Las Vegas’ most depressing crime ridden streets.. but you also get a peek inside the darkened windows of Howard Hughes’s hotels.

As the investigative reporting leads to modern times… the reader gets first hand testimony from numerous former Las Vegas cops… that fully substantiates… how much brutality was actually dispensed by cops… and it definitely wasn’t a one round fight. In the midst of the exhaustive research… on… and off… the police blotter… some hilarious anecdotes (at least hilarious to me) are shared. Such as… after Sonny Liston won the Heavyweight Championship from Floyd Patterson… many people from reporters to political figures weighed in with their disapproval… due to Liston’s enormous criminal history. One such detractor was Larry Merchant of the Philadelphia Daily News who “SUGGESTED THAT LISTON GET A TICKER-TAPE PARADE MADE OUT OF SEARCH WARRANTS.”

One of Sonny’s best friends at the end of his life… was the iconic former Heavyweight Champion Joe Louis. They both had the same post boxing defects… heroin… gambling… womanizing… money problems. When Sonny died… his funeral attracted between seven-hundred and a thousand mourners… “JOE LOUIS, ONE OF SIX PALLBEARERS, WAS THE ONLY HEAVYWEIGHT CHAMPION THERE AND CAME LATE BECAUSE, AS HE EXPLAINED, **HE WAS SHOOTING CRAPS… AND SONNY WOULD UNDERSTAND.”

The book may finish… without solving the title… but oh my… was the ride entertaining!

[Jim Nesbitt · Rating 5 out of 5]

With an arresting title that slaps a felony tag on an infamous death that was never officially declared a murder, Shaun Assael’s grim and vivid portrait of the violent and predatory life of former heavyweight champion Sonny Liston builds a strong, circumstantial case that he was a man plenty of people wanted to see dead.

If you’re expecting Assael, a former investigative reporter for ESPN, to definitively prove his case and single out Liston’s killer, you’ll be disappointed and miss the point of his excellent book. Ignore the title and enjoy a low-rider ride through the 60s and early 70s as the author recounts Liston’s rise and fall, his ties to mobsters, his one-punch dive to give up his title to Muhammad Ali, his star-crossed attempts at a late career comeback and his descent into a disturbingly natural thug life before rappers made that term so cliché and commonplace.

Along the way, you’ll take a panoramic pass through Las Vegas at the time when mob dominance was on the way out and the secretive and creepy Howard Hughes was ushering in the corporate takeover that would transform the desert city and surpass Bugsy Siegel’s dream. But freeze-dried glitz for the suckers isn’t the only thing that flashes through the windshield. Assael spins through Vegas’ seedier and crime-ridden black section, a ghetto without the projects of big cities, and glides through the casino machines lubricated by bribe-and-hush money, sex, booze and drugs that keep the high rollers happy and the politicians greased to look the other way.

He also masterfully portrays the town’s internal politics, it’s deep black-and-white divide, the civil war between cops and sheriff’s deputies and the preliminary rounds of the federal War on Drugs declared by Richard Nixon, part of Tricky Dick’s cynical ploy to make law-and-order a repackaged and rebranded version of the age-old ploy of keeping the black man down to capitalize on the backlash against the upheaval of the Sixties.

Liston had a foot in both the downtrodden and uptown worlds of Vegas. He was feared and revered wherever he went, living on the tattered hall pass of fading celebrity and a fearsome reputation for violence. He lived in an upscale subdivision and did his drinking, drug-dealing and whore hopping on the shady side of town. He kept a pistol in an ankle holster and wasn’t afraid to use his fists outside the ring, but could show an unexpectedly tender side to children.

An outlaw’s time in this world is never long and Sonny’s freewheeling life could no longer be tolerated. Like others before him, he outlived his time and his ticket needed to be punched. By the time you finish reading this book, you’ll believe that Liston’s death from a heroin overdose was anything but accidental.

[Jeff B. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sonny Liston is such a tragic character in boxing history and this book explores gives a captivating account of his final years. I gave this book 3.5 stars, rounded up to 4 stars. Here are my thoughts:

1. This book is as much about Las Vegas as it is about Sonny Liston. We learn all about the underbelly of Las Vegas of the late '60s, including stories about the underworld figures, racist police, corrupt politicians, and even stories about Frank Sinatra and Howard Hughes.

2. This book only briefly covers the early years of Sonny Liston and focuses more about the last decade of his life. It also covers what was going on with Ali and boxing in general, as well as about the mental decline of Joe Louis, which I found quite interesting.

3. Every conspiracy theory is entertained in this book, though I think the author does a good job of being even keeled and giving counterpoints to each conspiracy theory. I definitely don't buy the Ali-Liston 2 theory that Liston was promised Ali's future earnings. First of all, what a convoluted system - wouldn't it just be easier to give Liston a payout now than having to pay off Liston over a long time. Second of all, the fight was ended prematurely by an unqualified referee (Jersey Joe) who never gave Liston a count - who knows how it would have ended had it allowed to continue. Finally, we know that Liston is a quitter (see their first fight) and I think he knew this fight wasn't going to be any different. I understand back in the mid-60s people couldn't believe this loud mouth kid could beat the killer known as Liston, but over time Ali has been widely accepted as the greatest heavyweight of all time, so him beating Liston isn't so crazy at all.

4. The one thing I think the author got wrong was always saying Liston was "50 years old" or "near-50 years old". By all accounts he was between 38 and 40 at the time of his death, 42 at the oldest (though that's a stretch). This is supported by many facts, such as his arrest record, boxing record, and lack of military service.

Anyway, this book was a fun exploration of the underbelly of Las Vegas and boxing of the late-60s, as well as the tragic tale of Liston's life. It's well written and engaging, and reads like a noir novel. I would have liked more information on Liston's early years, but there are other biographies for that. I'm not sure I'm convinced Liston was murdered, but it was a topic worthy of exploration.

[DougInNC · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you are at all inclined toward reading this book, you should do so. Author Assael delivers on two counts. The title suggests this is an investigative work, plus the pages pack a rich story as a complement. Pick your pleasure and appreciate both.

Most readers will pursue this work for the tale's murder-mystery aspect. The depth and commitment to digging for facts are admirable. There is plenty of meat to chew, served in courses easily digested. Will you be satiated, comprehending that Charles "Sonny" Liston might have met his fate at the hand of another, just as the writer suspects? The adventure ride to uncover his discoveries is worth the price of this ticket to the roller-coaster life of a legendary sports figure.

I enjoyed the book's descriptions of Las Vegas history on par with the intrigue around title character. The time period was heavily researched and captured well. The next time visiting "sin city," I'll be looking past the present glitter to the past portrayed here.

There is sufficient background for readers unfamiliar with the famous and infamous of the boxing world, a universe neither limited to nor controlled by the pugilists. The 1960s, we learn, included massive troves of howling fans, lurking characters, and prying governmental entities weighing into the fray. There was much symbolic as well as true good and evil. While presenting the dynamics of the sport, the work stays focused on its end-of-a-life story.

For many readers, the author will not deliver the convincing knock-out blow that Mr. Liston was murdered. However, there is intrigue and there are mental images in this book that one might not find anywhere else. The pages transport you to a different world, a real world, a recent past, a time and place. That is what a work like this should do, and this one does it well.

[Cyan Night · Rating 5 out of 5]

Sonny Liston is a fascinating character. He was born and raised in very difficult circumstances - abused, neglected and was almost invisible to the world - an irony for a child who grew up so large. He somehow managed to become one of the best fighter not simply for his generation but also regarded often as top boxer of all times. As a man he was full of flaws, but not without virtue. Yet most people only saw him as a junkie, womaniser and an illiterate angry black criminal. And so his death was duly ignored and dismissed by the public as just another overdose. His talent for boxing was just astonishing I often wondered what great heights he might have attained if things hadn't been this rough for him at the start.

Shaun Assael painted a complete picture of his life through the eyes of everyone - those who used him, despised him, those who loved him and believed him, and those who simply understood him and put up with his terrible habits. The book was written in a true journalistic observational style, with little interceding personal opinions. He covered all grounds and explored as much as he could, exhausting every avenue of the mystery surrounding Liston's death. Every concerns, no matter how sensitive or unsavoury was discussed. Tragically, there was little that can be done today with such an enormous time lapse.

I thoroughly enjoyed the book. It was an easy read for a non-fiction with such a large cast of colourful characters, each playing a complicated role in that complex world where law enforcement and criminals were divided by a blurred line. It also shed some light on the beginnings of Las Vegas, with a few unexpected personalities such as Frank Sinatra - rather informative.

[patrick Lorelli · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a 2016 publication, I am just now getting to the review. I am someone from a generation that was raised by a father that boxing was a way of life for him when he was growing up in the ’30s and then fighting in WWII and Korea. It was baseball, boxing, football and how to play cards. I digress. This book about the murder of Sonny Liston, or what the author and most people felt was a murder is still a cold case. As much as, the author put forth a fantastic effort it just led to one dead end after another (no pun intended). The author will take you through his history of boxing matches, his marriages, numerous children, his philandering, drug addiction, you get the point. The positive side is you see where he came from and the hope he once had and that really it was probably the people around him early on how to lead him astray just my opinion. Then with all of the fighting he did and the injuries he had that either he did not tell or people in his corner did not do anything about. Once one injury happened and did not heal correctly I can see where he began drugs and then it just went from there, again just my opinion. He was a great fighter at one time and as you go through the book and see the people mainly men who made fun of him when 10 or 15 years before would not is a shame. Overall a good story and it is a shame to not find the truth that many people thought at the time that he was murdered. The author did a very good job on this book. I received this book from Netgalley.com I gave it 5 stars. Follow us at www.1rad-readerreviews.com

[Dewi Powell · Rating 4 out of 5]

For some reason, without knowing much about Sonny Liston beyond the surface storylines, I have always felt sorry for him. We’re told he was a bad person who did bad things, and all the mainstream seems to know him for is losing.

That a book exists to dive into the depths of his contradictions, and does so in the style of a noir crime thriller, is truly deserved. Shaun Assael has done a great job in both researching and presenting the facts (and theories) from a fascinating story.

From street parasites to high level politicians, Sonny swam and eventually drowned in dangerous waters. The characters that orbit Sonny are straight out of central casting, while the political climate and the context of the 1960s Las Vegas underworld are perfect settings for a murder mystery. You may have to remind yourself that this is a real story about a real person.

Sonny Liston is much more than a footnote in Muhammad Ali’s story. His death is much more than just another overdose. This book does not answer the question of how Sonny Liston really died. It does, however, throw serious suspicion over the official version of events and goes on to further the conversation about what actually happened, and why.

[Ed Dixon · Rating 1 out of 5]

I appreciate the amount of investigative work done by the author who had a hell of a task in unearthing information from fifty years prior, but that is about all that I enjoyed here. Although it is not the fault of the author because it based on real events, I had a somewhat difficult time differentiating between the different people involved in the Las Vegas Law Enforcement world at the time. The author treats the subject with utmost contempt, rather than seeking to understand the tragic life that lead to Sonny making the decisions he did. Additionally, there's really nothing here that imposes a feeling of investment on the reader. I have long been fascinated by Sonny Liston, yet I found myself in a constant struggle to keep my focus.

While I would say that this is amongst the worst sports books that I have ever read, there are moments where the author's skill shines through, and that is not surprising, for Shaun Assael is one of the best investigative Sports Journalists working today, his contributions to ESPN were exemplary.

[Cal Nordt · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was very well written, capturing the seamy side of Vegas in all its glory, and a real page-turner. I knew almost nothing about Sonny other than his fights. A fascinating book also about the pervasive influence of crime in the growth of Las Vegas, including Mafia figures, but covering the later times when the Mafia no longer ran the show. I loved it!

I was in the trade show transportation business and was forced to deal directly with a Mafia Teamster Steward in New York City and didn't find information I'd hoped about the Mafia and trade shows in Vegas, but I'm glad I managed to avoid dealing with them there--I'd heard the union was heavily Mafia controlled and just did my job quietly and they never really focused on me the way the Steward in NYC had, much closer to my home base at the time, Boston.

The degree of investigation is formidable and I congratulate Shaun for a book of historical importance that you will not be able to put down, an unusual combination!