I thought that it may be a good idea to start a topic where we can continuously post and read up on any real life organized crime related news.
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Opening Statements Begin in Gotti Retrial
By LARRY NEUMEISTER, Associated Press Writer
Wed Feb 22, 5:27 AM ET


NEW YORK - Jurors were presented with two portraits of John "Junior" Gotti on the first day of his retrial on federal racketeering charges — a ruthless mobster and a reformed family man.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Joon Hyun Kim told jurors during opening arguments Tuesday that Gotti was like his father, former Gambino crime family boss John Gotti, a merciless, violent mobster.

But defense lawyer Charles Carnesi said the son was out of the mob and ready to start a new and honorable legacy for the Gotti family's legacy.

A jury last fall acquitted Gotti, 42, of securities fraud but deadlocked on racketeering counts. If convicted, he could face 30 years in prison.

The most serious charge he faces relates to the 1992 kidnapping of radio host Curtis Sliwa. Sliwa, founder of the Guardian Angels crime fighting group, allegedly was targeted by Gotti because of his on-air rants against Gotti's father.

Kim said Gotti instructed underlings in the Gambino mob family to kidnap Sliwa and beat him.

On June 19, 1992, Sliwa got into a cab at dawn outside his Lower East Side apartment only to discover that the rear doors and windows were inoperable from within and that a gunman had been hiding on the front passenger floor.

He was shot twice and critically injured but managed to catapult into the front of the cab and out a window. "That was the price John Gotti made Curtis Sliwa pay for exercising his right to free speech," Kim said.

Carnesi said Gotti never ordered the kidnapping and beating of Sliwa.

Sliwa recovered and resumed his radio show and his attacks against the Gotti family. He is scheduled to testify.

Kim said Gotti joined the century-old Gambino family in the 1980s, climbing the mob's ladder from associate to soldier to high-ranking captain to street boss after his father was put in prison.

But Carnesi argued the government's case was built on the testimony of mob killers who made up lies to avoid life prison sentences and knew that Gotti's name could win them the best deal.

"If you're willing to say the name Gotti you can get almost anything," he said.

Carnesi said Gotti initially was under the spell of his larger-than-life father, but decided to reject organized crime when he pleaded guilty to other racketeering charges in 1999, serving five years in prison and giving up $1.5 million.

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