NEWPORT — May 9 is a date Newport will always associate with the old Tropicana. That's the date, in 1961, that Campbell County sheriff's candidate George Ratterman was drugged at the nightclub and later photographed naked in bed with stripper April Flowers.

        May 9 is also the date, this year, that Cincinnati restaurateur Jeff Ruby combines the city's shady past and his own birthday to throw a party at his newest restaurant, the Tropicana, still under construction at Newport on the Levee.

        And, according to some splashy invites circulating town, he's flying in the old Tropicana owner, Tito Carinci, cousin of Dean Martin and friend of Frank Sinatra. Mr. Carinci now owns a bar in Los Angeles.

        The Ruby party is a private affair, but the four-color, mass-mailed invitations make the most of the very public scandal that took place when the city was strongly influenced by Cleveland organized-crime groups.

        Mr. Ratterman, a former St. Xavier High School and University of Notre Dame football star who had pledged to clean up Newport, was “found naked in bed with stripper” the headlines read. The plot quickly unraveled, however, and Mr. Ratterman was elected.

        “This is the first I've heard of it,” Mr. Ratterman said of the new Tropicana when contacted Thursday at his home in Centennial, Colo. “I would like to visit the new club, but I wasn't invited to the party.”

        Mr. Ratterman, now in his late 70s, left town more than 30 years ago.

        He said it had been “years” since he saw Mr. Carinci, who he last heard was living in Las Vegas.

        The old Tropicana, at 10th and Monmouth streets (now the site of the Newport city government building), was one of the best-known of Newport's notorious gambling joints. It also offered music and strip shows.

        Mr. Ruby did not return telephone calls requesting comment.

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