Dellacroce was a stickler for the rules. Not only that, while he had most of the blue-collar factions on his side, I don't know if he, and Gotti certainly, would have wanted to go to war with The Gemini crew. Gotti for all his hitters and knuckle draggers in the world, feared those guys. Castellano didn't make a bad decision when he whacked DeMeo, DeMeo had been gung-ho for a long time and was doing things that Castellano nor Gaggi ever signed off on, not to mention he was scheduled to testify at a crime hearing into his stolen car ring, Paul feared he'd flip, and DeMeo like Paulie, had gotten comfortable with the big house on Long Island and the family life, at that point in his life, the common belief was Roy DeMeo wasn't doing any time.


And I don't know how one can say if Neil wasn't underboss, Paul would've never been upped to the top position. He had effectively been the acting boss for the family since the 70's. Carlo was sick, well before he died. It was Castellano who with DePalma engineered the Westchester Theater deal with Frattiano & Tommy Marston. All this while Dellacroce was still the official underboss. As long as Carlo was around, I think Paul would've been made boss either way.