{"id":1263,"date":"2024-12-17T17:47:46","date_gmt":"2024-12-17T18:47:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/extraniceshirts.org\/?p=1263"},"modified":"2024-12-23T13:03:22","modified_gmt":"2024-12-23T13:03:22","slug":"a-mob-victims-spooky-casino-ship-is-sitting-abandoned-in-a-florida-dock-photos","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/extraniceshirts.org\/index.php\/2024\/12\/17\/a-mob-victims-spooky-casino-ship-is-sitting-abandoned-in-a-florida-dock-photos\/","title":{"rendered":"A Mob Victim\u2019s Spooky Casino Ship is Sitting Abandoned in a Florida Dock: Photos"},"content":{"rendered":"

A gambling ship that once belonged to murdered restaurant and casino tycoon Gus Boulis is sitting abandoned in a Florida dock, and it\u2019s still decked out with slot machines and gaming tables with casino chips intact.<\/p>\n

\"
Creepy: Gaming tables still adorned with with chips. (Image: Leland Kent)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

These extraordinary images were taken by photographer and urban explorer Leland Kent, who has long been fascinated by abandoned places and showcases them in his books<\/a> and on his website, abandonedsoutheast.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n

These images show the Blue Horizon casino cruise ship, which once took gamblers on \u201ccruises to nowhere\u201d \u2013 or at least out into international waters, where Florida\u2019s gambling laws don’t apply. The vessel last sailed in 2016, just before its owner, PB Gaming, went bust.<\/p>\n

\"Blue
Old school slots and a carpet to turn the stomach of a hardened old sea dog. (Image: Leland Kent)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Blue Horizon was once known as SunCruz VI when it was part of Boulis\u2019 SunCruz fleet. Boulis was the founder of the Miami Subs sandwich restaurant chain and the SunCruz casino cruise business, which once sailed gambling trips out of Jacksonville, Key Largo, Port Canaveral, and Myrtle Beach, SC.<\/p>\n

Boulis was murdered by the mafia<\/a> in 2001 when he was gunned down while sitting in his car.<\/p>\n

Who Was Gus Boulis?<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Born in Kavala, a city in northern Greece, Konstantinos \u201cGus\u201d Boulis joined the merchant marines in the 1960s as a teenager. He jumped ship in Canada, arriving in North America with nothing but the shirt on his back.<\/p>\n

\"Gus
Multimillionaire Gus Boulis, who founded the SunCruz fleet and was later murdered in a Mafia hit related to its sale. (Image: Sun Sentinel<\/em>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

His first job was as a dishwasher at a Mr. Submarine sandwich outlet in Toronto. By the time he was 25, he had been made a partner in the business and he helped expand it into a chain with 200 outlets. Boulis sold his stake in the business, which made him a millionaire while still in his twenties.<\/p>\n

He made his way to Florida, where he founded Miami Subs and other restaurants, before stumbling on the idea of casino cruises. In 1994, he purchased a ship, The Winston Churchill, for $2 million, and SunCruz was born.<\/p>\n

SunCruz was a big hit with Florida\u2019s gamblers, although not so much with local, state, and federal authorities, who were forever on Boulis\u2019 back.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The US government eventually got him on an obscure federal statute that requires owners of fleets to be American citizens. The law was enacted in the 1920s to protect US shipping interests from foreign competition. Boulis became a US citizen in 1997, but purchased most of his fleet before that.<\/p>\n

As part of a settlement with the US government, Boulis agreed to pay $2 million in fines and to divest himself of the SunCruz fleet over the ensuing three years.<\/p>\n

Boulis agreed to sell the fleet to the notorious lobbyist\u00a0Jack Abramoff<\/a>\u00a0and his associate Adam Kidan for $147.5 million.<\/p>\n

Abramoff and Kidan were later imprisoned for fraud over the deal. They were found to have used a fake\u00a0wire transfer\u00a0to dupe lenders into believing they had made a $23 million down payment on SunCruz so they could obtain a $60 million loan.<\/p>\n

\u2018Big Tony\u2019<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Kidan had brought Gambino mobster Anthony \u201cBig Tony\u201d Moscatiello in on the deal. But when Boulis heard about the phony wire transfer, he tried to pull out. Prosecutors later argued Moscatiello had Boulis killed because the latter was trying to wrestle control back of the fleet.<\/p>\n

\"Blue
Scary craps:\u00a0 (Image: Leland Kent)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Since Boulis\u2019 death, the SunCruz VI has passed through a succession of owners and gone through several name changes before becoming the Blue Horizon, but it rarely sailed as a casino cruise ship for more than a couple of months with each new owner.<\/p>\n

Gambling expansion in Florida by the powerful Seminole tribe has made the business far less lucrative, and cruises to nowhere are no longer going anywhere.<\/p>\n

\"Blue
Ghost Ship: The Blue Horizon, formerly the SunCruz VI. (Image: Leland Kent)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The post A Mob Victim\u2019s Spooky Casino Ship is Sitting Abandoned in a Florida Dock: Photos<\/a> appeared first on Casino.org<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A gambling ship that once belonged to murdered restaurant and casino tycoon Gus Boulis is sitting abandoned in a Florida dock, and it\u2019s…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1265,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[11],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/extraniceshirts.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1263"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/extraniceshirts.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/extraniceshirts.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/extraniceshirts.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/extraniceshirts.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1263"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/extraniceshirts.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1263\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1271,"href":"https:\/\/extraniceshirts.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1263\/revisions\/1271"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/extraniceshirts.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1265"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/extraniceshirts.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1263"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/extraniceshirts.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1263"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/extraniceshirts.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1263"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}