Tropicana Casino & Resort Atlantic City did not speak English, claimed Doyle's wife was a fraud, and ended his friendship with Conan Doyle. In 1929, the Ambassador was the site of the infamous Atlantic City Conference, in which a number of organized crime bosses, including Al Capone, Meyer Lansky and Lucky Luciano, negotiated their territorial rights after a wave of violence. In 1931, as Philadelphia gangster Mickey Duffy slept in the hotel, he was shot and killed by assailants who were never caught. The incident was dramatized in the series "Boardwalk Empire", with a character called Mieczyslaw "Mickey Doyle" Kuzik. The hotel eventually closed in the
Meyer Lansky criminal activities to break up rallies held by the pro-Nazi German-American Bund. He recalled a particular rally in Yorkville, a German neighborhood in Manhattan, that he and 14 other associates disrupted: During World War II, Lansky was also instrumental in helping the Office of Naval Intelligence's Operation Underworld, in which the government recruited criminals to watch out for German infiltrators and submarine-borne saboteurs. Lansky helped arrange a deal with the government via a high-ranking U.S. Navy official. This deal would secure the release of Luciano from prison; in exchange, the Mafia would provide security for the warships that were being