Named after his father, John Joseph Gotti was born in the Bronx in New York on October 27, 1940. The son of a construction worker, he had five brothers. The Gotti family moved to Sheepshead Bay, Brooklyn, when John was in the fourth grade. Already street tough, Gotti and his brothers held their own against the neighborhood's reigning hoodlums, the Santoro brothers. A bright student, Gotti attended P.S. (Public School) 209 through the end of the sixth grade.
When Gotti was twelve his family moved to Brownsville-East, New York. The area supported a thriving underworld (Mafia activity). The breeding ground for the mob's hit squad called Murder, Inc., it was the former stomping ground of gangsters such as Benjamin "Bugsy"Siegel and "Kid Twist" Reles. Gotti attended P.S. 178 and, together with his friend Angelo Ruggiero, joined a gang known as the Fulton-Rockaway Boys. Soon recognized as a bright and tough opponent, he fought members of rival gangs such as the Liberty Park Tots and New Lots Boys. Gotti's public school education ended on June 7, 1954, when he was suspended from the eighth grade. He never returned to school.
Even as a teenager, Gotti was confident and self-assured-- attributes that attracted the notice of the neighborhood's older gangsters. Gotti's adult criminal record began at the age of eighteen, when he was picked up for frequenting a gambling location. A favorite pupil of the local Mafia heads, Carmine and Danny Fatico, Gotti also made a favorable impression on the mob's Gambino family before he was twenty years old.
In 1960, Gotti married Victoria DiGiorgio, the daughter of an Italian construction contractor and a Russian-Jewish woman. The couple eventually settled in Queens, in Howard Beach-Ozone Park, a blue-collar Italian-American neighborhood. Still a young struggling petty criminal, Gotti was arrested in January of 1965 for bookmaking and again, two months later, for attempted burglary. (A bookmaker, or bookie, is someone who accepts and pays off bets.)He spent one year in jail. He was arrested again in December 1967 for stealing a truckload of electrical equipment and clothing from Kennedy airport in New York--and again, the following month, for the same offense. When he was released after serving three years in prison, Gotti moved in to replace the Fatico brothers, who were stepping down as the neighborhood mob leaders. Soon he was reporting to Aniello Dellacroce, Angelo Ruggiero's uncle, a powerful underboss in the Mob's Gambino family.
On May 22, 1973, a man named James McBratney was killed by three men in Snoopy's Bar in Staten Island, New York. The reason for McBratney's murder has been the subject of debate. The killing might have been payback for a number of thefts for which McBratney was responsible. And it might have been intended as punishment for his supposed role in the kidnapping and murder of Manny Gambino, the nephew of Mafia boss Carlo Gambino.
Although most of the seven witnesses claimed not to have seen the McBratney murder, the killers were finally identified as Angelo Ruggiero, Ralphie "the Wig" Galione, and John Gotti. More than two years later, on June 2,1975, Gotti pleaded guilty to attempted manslaughter in the second degree, for which he was sentenced to four years in prison. Paroled (released from prison early) a little more than two years later, Gotti returned home on July 28, 1977.
The McBratney killing had helped Gotti move up within the Mafia. Soon after his release from prison he was formally initiated into the Mafia to become what is known as a "made man." He continued to report to Dellacroce, the Gambino family underboss. But he began to express dissatisfaction with the chain of command. Carlo Gambino, the mob's overall boss, had been replaced by Gambino's brother-in-law, "Big Paul" Castellano. Gotti disliked Castellano, and felt that Dellacroce was more deserving of the position of overall boss.
On March 18, 1980, Gotti's neighbor, a fifty-one-year-old factory worker named John Favara, headed to his home in Howard Beach. As he drove down 157th Avenue, he was blinded by the sun. He never saw Frank Gotti, John Gotti's youngest son, pull into the street on a motor bike. Favara struck and killed the twelve-year-old boy.
Taking the advice of a priest he consulted, Favara did not attend Frankie's funeral. Nor did he contact Frankie's parents to offer his sympathy. Within days of the accident, Favara began to receive threats against his life. He ignored the warnings and continued about his business, working a regular shift at the Castro Convertible factory on Long Island. And he continued to drive the car that had killed Frankie Gotti. On May 28, Favara was forced into a van by three men after he left work. He was never seen again.
Questioned about Favara's disappearance, Gotti said that he and his wife had been in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, when his neighbor was abducted. The police, meanwhile, received a tip saying that Favara had been hacked to death with a chain saw--and entombed in a car that was compacted into a square-foot block of scrap metal. Many people concluded that Gotti was behind the apparent murder. But others--including police detectives--suspected that the kidnapping had been performed without Gotti's blessing--as an attempt to win approval from Gotti and his crew. Favara's body was never found--and no one was ever charged in his kidnapping.
In December of 1985, FBI agents who kept Gotti under surveillance noticed that he had begun to receive unusual respect from other mobsters. They approached him politely, embraced, and kissed him--a Mafia custom to show respect to a leader. Gotti's status within the mob had changed.
And with good reason. Gotti's mentor, Dellacroce, had died on December2, 1985. Two weeks later--on December 16, 1985--seventy-two-year-old Gambino boss Paul Castellano was killed in a hail of gunfire outside a Manhattan steak house. And Gotti--who was undoubtedly behind the killing--stepped in to replace the slain mobster as the head of the nation's largest and most powerful Mafia family. No charges were ever brought in Castellano's murder.
By the late 1980s Gotti was on the federal government's wanted list. Brought to trial on charges of racketeering, he faced the possibility of an extended jail term that would inevitably end his reign as one of the youngest dons (bosses) in the history of the Mafia. But on March 13, 1987, Gotti was acquitted of all charges. The U.S. Attorney told the press, "The jury has spoken. Obviously they perceived there was something wrong with the evidence." But he knew better. The jury had been tampered with. The jury's foreman had been bribed to make sure that Gotti was not convicted. Gotti, who seemed immune (protected) from the law, became known as the "Teflon Don" because government prosecutors were unable to make criminal charges against him stick.
That is, until 1992. The Justice Department, which had spent an estimated $75 million to monitor the Mafia don's private conversations, had tapes that provided evidence of Gotti's involvement in mob-related murder and racketeering. A federal judge ruled that Bruce Cutler, Gotti's attorney in the previous trial, could not defend him. Because Cutler was included in some of the recorded conversations used as evidence against Gotti, his participation in the trial was considered to be a conflict of interest. The jury was sequestered (put in seclusion) to prevent any tampering. And Salvatore "Sammy the Bull" Gravano--Gotti's right-hand man--was prepared to testify against his former boss. (Before standing trial himself for racketeering and murder, Gravano became an informant against Gotti in exchange for a guarantee that he would receive no more than a twenty-year sentence. Without making a deal with the government, Gravano faced a probable sentence of life imprisonment with no possibility of parole. While he waited to testify, Gravano was held in a secret safe house in Virginia to ensure that he was not assassinated by Mafia hit men before the case went to trial.)
By the end of the trial, every one of the fourteen counts against Gotti had stuck. James Fox, the assistant director of the FBI in New York, told the press, "The Teflon is gone. The don is covered with Velcro and every charge stuck." Convicted of racketeering and murder charges, Gotti was sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole.
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