By the 1970s, federal authorities investigating mobsters in Kansas City charged more than a dozen operatives with conspiring to skim $2 million in gambling revenue from Las Vegas casinos, including the Tropicana. Charges connected to the Tropicana alone resulted in five convictions.

The seconds ticked away early Wednesday morning until the husk of the Tropicana Las Vegas resort, deserted since its April 2024 closing date, met a final and spectacular end, bringing to a close the era of the 67-year-old structure once a bastion for visitors from across the country.