Robert Maheu

In the 15 years that Robert Maheu served as the public face of Howard Hughes, he never once met his reclusive and eccentric boss in person. A former operative for both the CIA and the FBI--he notoriously solicited the help of the Mafia in an assassination plot against Fidel Castro--Maheu first came to know Hughes when the famous aviator enlisted his help in spying on an ex-girlfriend.

Before long, Maheu, who died Aug. 4 at age 90, became Hughes' right-hand man. During the 1960s, when Hughes lived in seclusion in a penthouse atop the Desert Inn hotel in Las Vegas, "Maheu...

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