California Gamblers Snub Federal Inquiry
1950-1953 During the 1950 federal hearings on organized crime, two Northern California gamblers — Walter “Big Bill” Melburn Pechart and David “Dave” Nathan Kessel — were uncooperative, according to the questioners. They were Senators Estes Kefauver (D-Tenn.), Charles Tobey (R-N.H.) and Alexander Wiley (R-Wisc.), congressmen who comprised the Kefauver Committee, or the United States Senate…