Looking back on the whole gotti trial and gravano fiasco, could there have been alternative scenario between them instead of what really happened? Hypothetically, considering all the evidence against Gotti, could Gotti have let Gravano testify against him in order to get Gravano off the hook? I know this breaks a cardinal rule of LCN but if it seems Gotti is going to be 99% found guilty and Gravano is just insurance for the feds, could they have manipulated the FBI so that Gravano could have walked (not witness protection) and become acting boss for Gotti? Everybody knows the mafia exists "not-so-secret society", Valachi testified about the whole organiztion and even Joe Bonnano wrote a tell-all book which even helped with the commission trial. I know it seems absurd, but would there be a situation where the commission would allow for something like this? If this was ever to happen, I wouldn't see this as "ratting" but as gaming the system.
Thoughts?
You propose an interesting hypothetical,and it would be amazing cool if something like that actually succeeded. From what I understand,the opposite was true. Gotti not only nixed a plea bargain for Sammy,he made Sammy get a different lawyer than Gotti. Additionally, Gotti's team was going to move for separate trials.
The conventional wisdom is that after hearing the tapes,Sammy realized that Gotti looked at him as an opportunist,who only was interested in furthering his own interests.Gotti is heard saying basically that Sammy was killing guys so he could take over their businesses. Gotti expresses some paranoia as well, wondering if Sammy is trying to build his own power base.
Given the tapes,and Gotti's takeover of Sammy's defense strategy,Sammy realized that Gotti's team was going to paint Sammy as a loose cannon. If Sammy would have been tried separately,Gotti would have hung him out to dry,in the hope of fading heat for some of the murders off of himself.
After digesting all of this,and still stinging from Gotti's backstabbing on the tapes,Sammy realizes that his only shot is to turn informant.Otherwise,there was a real possibility that he would go down for the major charges,and that Gotti would either walk,or get convicted on less serious counts.
Maybe a scenario involving a different Boss or Family might play out like you mentioned,but the last thing that a guy like Gotti would do is take one for the team.He wanted to beat the case,and throw Sammy to the wolves.
