Born: October 27, 1940

John Gotti graduated from a youth gang and moved quickly through the ranks of the Mafia. Fond of wearing $1,800 suits and hand-painted ties, he became a powerful don (Mafia leader) at a relatively young age. He seemed immune to the government’s attempts to convict him—until a close associate betrayed him.

Rough, tough, and dirt poor

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...