1. John Gotti ordered and helped to orchestrate the murder of Gambino boss Paul Castellano in December 1985 and took over the family shortly thereafter, leading what was described as the most powerful crime syndicate in the United States.
56 Facts About John Gotti
1. 2.
John Gotti quickly became one of the Gambino family's biggest earners and a protege of Aniello Dellacroce, the family's underboss, operating out of Ozone Park, Queens.
3.
At his peak, John Gotti was one of the most powerful and dangerous crime bosses in the United States.
4.
John Gotti was later given the nickname "the Teflon Don" after three high-profile trials in the 1980s resulted in acquittals, though it was later revealed that the trials had been tainted by jury tampering, juror misconduct, and witness intimidation.
5.
In 1992, John Gotti was convicted of five murders, conspiracy to commit murder, racketeering, obstruction of justice, tax evasion, illegal gambling, extortion, and loansharking.
6.
John Gotti received life in prison without parole and was transferred to United States Penitentiary, Marion in Illinois.
7.
John Gotti died of throat cancer on June 10,2002, at the United States Medical Center for Federal Prisoners in Springfield, Missouri.
8.
John Gotti was born in the Bronx borough of New York City on October 27,1940.
9.
John Gotti was the fifth of the thirteen children of John Joseph Gotti Sr.
10.
John Gotti was involved in street gangs associated with New York mafiosi from the age of 12.
11.
John Gotti met his future wife, Victoria DiGiorgio, who was of half-Italian and half-Russian descent, at a bar in 1958.
12.
John Gotti attempted to work legitimately in 1962 as a presser in a coat factory and as an assistant truck driver.
13.
John Gotti was arrested a third time for hijacking while out on bail two months later, this time for stealing a load of cigarettes worth $50,000 on the New Jersey Turnpike.
14.
Later that year, John Gotti pleaded guilty to the hijacking of Northwest Airlines cargo trucks and was sentenced to three years at Lewisburg Federal Penitentiary.
15.
John Gotti took responsibility for managing the Bergin crew's illegal gambling operation, where he proved himself to be an effective enforcer.
16.
John Gotti was not yet a made man due to the membership books' having been closed following the 1957 Apalachin meeting, but Fatico named him acting capo of the Bergin crew soon after he was paroled.
17.
John Gotti was identified by eyewitnesses and by a police insider, and was arrested for the killing in June 1974.
18.
John Gotti was able to strike a plea bargain with the help of attorney Roy Cohn, and was sentenced to four years' imprisonment for attempted manslaughter for his part in the hit.
19.
John Gotti was released in July 1977, after two years' imprisonment; he was initiated into the family, now under the command of Castellano, and immediately promoted to replace Fatico as capo of the Bergin crew.
20.
John Gotti's crew reported directly to Dellacroce as part of the concessions given by Castellano to keep Dellacroce as underboss, and John Gotti was regarded as Dellacroce's protege.
21.
Besides his cut of his subordinates' earnings, John Gotti ran his own loansharking operation, and held a no-show job as a plumbing supply salesman.
22.
Unconfirmed allegations by FBI informants claimed that John Gotti financed drug deals.
23.
In December 1978, John Gotti assisted in the Lufthansa heist at Kennedy Airport, the largest unrecovered cash robbery in history.
24.
John Gotti had made arrangements for the getaway van to be crushed and baled at a scrapyard in Brooklyn.
25.
John Gotti is widely assumed to have ordered Favara's murder despite him and his family leaving on vacation for Florida three days prior.
26.
John Gotti was indicted on two occasions in his last two years as the Bergin capo, with both cases coming to trial after his ascension to boss of the Gambino family.
27.
John Gotti quickly became dissatisfied with Castellano's leadership of the Gambino family, regarding the new boss as being too isolated and greedy.
28.
John Gotti had an economic interest as well; he had a running dispute with Castellano on the split John Gotti took from truck hijackings at Kennedy Airport.
29.
John Gotti was rumored to be expanding into drug dealing, a lucrative trade Castellano had banned under threat of death.
30.
Indeed, John Gotti's planned hit would have been the first unsanctioned hit on a boss of the Five Families since Frank Costello was nearly killed in 1957, and would have been the first on any boss since Angelo Bruno in 1980.
31.
John Gotti knew that it would be too risky to solicit support from the other four bosses, since they had longstanding ties to Castellano.
32.
John Gotti did not consider approaching the Genovese family; Castellano's ties with Genovese boss Vincent "The Chin" Gigante were so close that any overture to a Genovese soldier would have been a tipoff.
33.
However, Gotti could count on the complicity of Gambino consigliere Joseph N Gallo.
34.
Several days after the murder, John Gotti was named to a three-man committee, along with Gallo and DeCicco, to temporarily run the Gambino family pending the election of a new boss.
35.
However, it was an open secret that John Gotti was acting boss in all but name, and nearly all of the family's capos knew he had been the one behind the hit.
36.
John Gotti was formally named the new boss of the family at a meeting of twenty capos held on January 15,1986.
37.
John Gotti appointed DeCicco as the new underboss while retaining Gallo as consigliere.
38.
John Gotti often smiled and waved at news cameras at his trials, which gained him favor with some of the general public.
39.
When John Gotti's trial began in March 1986, Piecyk testified he was unable to remember who attacked him.
40.
From jail, John Gotti ordered the murder of DiBernardo by Gravano; both DiBernardo and Ruggiero had been vying to succeed DeCicco until Ruggiero accused DiBernardo of challenging John Gotti's leadership.
41.
When Ruggiero, under indictment, had his bail revoked for his abrasive behavior in preliminary hearings, a frustrated John Gotti instead promoted Armone to underboss.
42.
However, due to Pape's misconduct, John Gotti knew from the beginning of the trial that he could do no worse than a hung jury.
43.
In 1987, the FBI warned John Gotti they had recorded Genovese consigliere Louis Manna discussing another hit on John Gotti and his brother.
44.
John Gotti was able to influence the New Jersey-based DeCavalcante crime family in 1988.
45.
In 1989, John Gotti ordered the murder of real estate developer Fred Weiss, because he was worried that Weiss might become a government witness in exchange for leniency, and he ordered the DeCavalcante family to carry out the hit.
46.
John Gotti had his occupation listed as a salesman for a plumbing contracting company.
47.
John Gotti announced his intent to kill soldier Louis DiBono, who had ignored a summons to meet with Gotti to discuss his mismanagement of a drywall business he held with Gotti and Gravano.
48.
However, John Gotti was acquitted of all six assault and conspiracy charges at trial on February 9,1990.
49.
John Gotti subsequently hired Albert Krieger, a Miami attorney who had worked with Joseph Bonanno, to replace Cutler.
50.
John Gotti was the highest-ranking member of a New York crime family to turn informer until Joseph Massino in 2003.
51.
John Gotti himself became increasingly hostile during the trial, and at one point, Glasser threatened to remove him from the courtroom.
52.
John Gotti was incarcerated at the United States Penitentiary at Marion, Illinois.
53.
John Gotti spent the majority of his sentence in effective solitary confinement, allowed out of his cell for only one hour a day.
54.
John Gotti maintains that he has since left the Gambino family.
55.
In 1998, John Gotti was diagnosed with throat cancer and sent to the United States Medical Center for Federal Prisoners in Springfield, Missouri for surgery.
56.
John Gotti's body was interred in a crypt next to his son, Frank.