re: Gotti & Plea Deals

Gotti not allowing his guys to make plea deals was weird at the time but I kind of understand his 'logic' I guess. I think a lot had to do with ego, and an us versus them (government) mentality. It wasn't so much to protect the existence of the mob, because he even said himself "Why hide it, people know what we are..." ... I think he just absolutely despised the government and society as a whole and would never allow them to "help" in any way. It seemed to him being in the mob was almost like being at war with legit society as a whole.

A few people got screwed over pretty bad because of that attitude though... I think it was Joe Armone (or Joe N. Gallo, can't remember) that could have been granted bail if he pled guilty and would have been able to spend one of his last Christmas' with his family, and Gotti told him he couldn't (Armone had been in the family like 3x longer too...the irony)
And his brother Gene who probably would have just served 10 years at the most. I bet prosecutors were itching to make a deal he was out on bail awaiting the trial for a long long time they probably wanted to wrap it up. Instead he serves 50 years -basically- a life sentence (ironic because he helped fix a lot of trials for the Gambinos but couldn't successfully fix his own)

Then you have the Genovese who clip a guy for NOT accepting a plea deal.