When Derek Stevens and his brother Greg relocated to Las Vegas after selling their successful Michigan auto parts company, he wanted to get a taste of the casino business that had brought him west so many times. After investing in the Riviera, the brothers bought half of the Golden Gate in Downtown Las Vegas, one of the oldest casinos in town. After a cram course in casino operations, they bought the former Fitzgerald’s casino. The renamed it the D casino (for the street where it’s located and the first letter of their former hometown, Detroit). Derek Stevens explains what they like about Downtown and their throwback operating principles of fun and excitement, along with a good gamble. Steven spoke with GGB Publisher Roger Gros at the D in December.

D Casino Owner

Rhon­dor Dowlat-Ros­tant

Homi­cide of­fi­cers are in­ves­ti­gat­ing sev­er­al mur­ders that oc­curred on Tues­day night, in­clud­ing the mur­der of a casi­no own­er and a dou­bles ven­dor in sep­a­rate in­ci­dents.

1. The D Las Vegas Casino Hotel (formerly Fitzgeralds) is a 34-story, 638-room hotel and casino in downtown Las Vegas, Nevada, owned and operated by Derek and Greg Stevens. The D Las Vegas also consists of a dinner theater called Showroom at the D. The D is located at the eastern end of the Fremont Street Experience.
2. Flemish for “little man pee”, this bronze statue was installed by the D’s owner, Derek Stevens in honor of his Belgian heritage and great sense of humor. The plaque in front of the pee stream reads “Manneken Pis has been described as hard-working yet fun-loving, affable and slightly irreverent, all qualities embraced by the D Las Vegas.”.

Dou­bles ven­dor Ka­reem Jervis, who worked at the fa­mous Sauce dou­bles, was shot while con­duct­ing sales at a stall just off Curepe Junc­tion around 7pm Tues­day.

In sim­i­lar na­ture, last year Au­gust 11, gun­men had shot and killed Jervis’ men­tor dou­bles ven­dor Shaz­ard Man­ick, who al­so worked at Sauce dou­bles. Po­lice de­scribed Jervis’ mur­der as a hit but is yet to de­ter­mine a mo­tive for the killing.

Mean­while, pres­i­dent of the Route 3 Maxi Taxi As­so­ci­a­tion (Green band) Julien St George is call­ing on a meet­ing with the T&T Po­lice Ser­vice.

Derek Stevens, one of the owners of the D Hotel, located in down Las Vegas, revealed the name of his new hotel Thursday. The announcement about the Circa Resort and Casino came after Las Vegas Mayor Carolyn Goodman’s State of the City address. Video below shows the announcement being made at the Downtown Las Vegas Event Center.

He said his as­so­ci­a­tion in­tends to take se­cu­ri­ty in­to their own hands by in­stalling sur­veil­lance cam­eras in the area.

“This is the sec­ond time a dou­bles ven­dor is killed and the maxi taxi stand and taxi stand are right there and we have a con­stant flow of peo­ple round-the-clock. Maybe by in­stalling cam­eras it will serve as a de­ter­rent. We al­so want to see an in­creased po­lice pres­ence and reg­u­lar pa­trols night and day by the po­lice,” St George said.

“Just like last time when gun­men came peo­ple were scam­per­ing out of max­is and taxis and it is just hor­ri­ble so we need to work on a de­ter­rent which is the cam­eras as an im­me­di­ate res­o­lu­tion. Mean­while, we will re­quest a meet­ing with the po­lice and wait on them for it to hap­pen,” he added.

In Diego Mar­tin, casi­no own­er Lu­cius John, 35, was shot by ban­dits who en­tered his es­tab­lish­ment - LA’s Amuse­ment Club around 7.15 pm.

John who was sit­ting fac­ing a door saw the ban­dits ap­proach­ing and was able to ward two of his fam­i­ly mem­bers be­fore he was shot.

Af­ter John was shot, po­lice said, the ban­dits ran away.

Golden Nugget Casino

Guardian Me­dia un­der­stands that John had on­ly opened up his casi­no two weeks ago and had plans in de­vel­op­ing it big­ger.

In the night’s third mur­der, at 7.30 pm Mick­el Di­az, 35, was shot and killed in front of his home in Tu­na­puna. Rel­a­tives told po­lice that short­ly be­fore the killing they heard Di­az ex­chang­ing words with some­one while in the yard.

They said they heard a se­ries of gun­shots and when they checked they saw Di­az ly­ing on the ground bleed­ing from mul­ti­ple gun­shot wounds. Di­az died on the scene, po­lice said.

Treasure Island

There was al­so a shoot­ing in­ci­dent in Ari­ma around 8.30 am when a man from Ma­tu­ri­ta Ex­ten­sion, who was lim­ing near a shop at Hill­top Dri­ve, Ma­tu­ri­ta Ex­ten­sion, Ari­ma, was ap­proached by two armed men. Po­lice said the vic­tim was shot 14 times about his body but sur­vived.

The vic­tim was tak­en to the Ari­ma Dis­trict Hos­pi­tal where he was treat­ed and ward­ed in a sta­ble con­di­tion.

D Casino Las Vegas

In­ves­ti­ga­tions are al­so con­tin­u­ing in­to that shoot­ing.