Mob Star Page 17

  Peter Gotti, along with Jamesy and two other men, left the wake and returned to the club. The clubhouse attendant told them that whoever took the bus had loaded it with adding machines and typewriters and departed the premises by crashing through a gate. The men, figuring that it would be hard to hide a school bus, decided to look around the neighborhood.

  The bus was quickly located lurching along on Rockaway Boulevard; the driver was having trouble operating the stick shift. As soon as the driver veered down a side street, the car full of Bergin men swerved in front and cut him off. Jamesy dragged the driver out and threw him in the car. Peter got in the bus. Both vehicles then returned to the club.

  Gene called from the funeral home and Jamesy reported the news. “I got the bus and the guy.”

  “Hold him. I’ll be right there.”

  The quivering thief was taken to a back room to await his fate. He was approaching meltdown when Gene burst in. But Gene was surprisingly mellow. Perhaps it was the effect of the wake.

  “I don’t mind [that] you are a thief. I am a thief. I don’t mind you stealing, but you can’t rob from us. Now go.”

  John Gotti was always explaining the rules to Jamesy. About guns, Gotti said “It’s nice to have them close by, but don’t carry them.” Except for the few hidden at the Bergin, the crew stashed most of its guns in members’ homes.

  A don’t-hang-out-with-kidnappers rule was adopted after Gotti learned that Jamesy had socialized at a disco with three men Gotti believed were kidnappers.

  “I already killed a kidnapper,” Gotti said, “and I don’t want you around them.”

  Johnny told Jamesy that the only reason he pleaded guilty in the McBratney case was that Angelo was not going to get a plea offer unless he accepted the same deal. Angelo, who was identified by two witnesses, told Jamesy that he and his gumbah should have gone into Snoope’s Bar with bags over their faces.

  Jamesy saw Paul Castellano once. He remembered Gotti had said this about the Pope: “Paul’s the boss, but we’re with Neil. Paul has nothing to do with us.”

  The encounter took place at a Manhattan restaurant when Jamesy spotted Castellano dining with Neil Dellacroce and a few other Family men. Jamesy had been pulling a few robberies lately. Neil waved him over.

  “How are you doing?” Neil asked.

  “All right.”

  “What are you doing?”

  “Robbing.”

  At that, Castellano looked up. “Good boy,” he said.

  Jamesy was never admitted to the Bergin’s inner circle. He did learn, however, that once you belonged to the circle, you belonged to Gotti.

  Jamesy was present when a crew member asked Gotti about the possibility of a “release” so that he might associate with another crew.

  Gotti flashed a disbelieving smile and joked that Jamesy was the chairman of his “release department,” which was never open. Gotti then faced the crew member; his smile had left as fast as it came.

  “You don’t get released from my crew. You have lived with John Gotti and you will die with John Gotti.”

  15

  BOY ON A MINIBIKE

  HOWARD BEACH WAS A safe place to raise children. It had none of the problems—poverty, drugs, crime, poor schools—that lay to waste so many other New York City children.

  The Gotti home near the corner of Eighty-fifth Street and 160th Avenue was on a quiet block, as close to the Atlantic Ocean as the man of the house had been years before as a twelve-year-old boy in Brooklyn. His solidly middle-class neighbors lived in well-kept homes along wide, tree-lined streets patrolled by a civic association to which Victoria Gotti contributed money.

  The Gotti family included five children now, two girls and three boys. The girls and one boy had entered their teenage years. The middle son, twelve-year-old Frank, was about to. He was a promising student who enjoyed sports. He and a son of Crazy Sally Polisi were on a junior-football team called the Redskins.

  On March 18, 1980, Frank borrowed a friend’s motorized minibike and went for a spin. He explored a trail next to the Belt Parkway, an expressway on the northern border of Howard Beach that isolated it between Ozone Park and the ocean. Near where Eighty-seventh Street dead-ended at a fence along the parkway, Frank turned south toward 157th Avenue; he was about six blocks from home.

  It was late in the day. John Favara, the driver of a car westbound on 157th Avenue, was confronted by a low white sun. Favara, age 51, a service manager for a furniture manufacturer, lived with his wife and two adopted children on Eighty-sixth Street, directly behind the Gotti family on Eighty-fifth Street. His son Scott was good friends with the oldest Gotti son, John.

  Favara was coming home from work. On 157th Avenue, near Eighty-seventh, a house was under renovation. A dumpster had been placed in the street to collect the debris. It was on Favara’s right. Favara did not notice the boy on the minibike dash into the street from the other side of the dumpster, and his car stuck and killed Frank Gotti.

  The sudden horror and violence of the boy’s death left a gaping hole in the Gotti family heart. They fell into a deep, black depression, which no doubt was similar to the one that would soon visit the Favara household.

  The grief felt by Victoria, whose life was mainly her children, was especially acute and tinged by a bitter rage for the presumed recklessness of Favara. For a long time, she dressed only in black. In her living room, a photograph of Frank was draped in black and hung over a setting of candles and flowers. A Queens detective who saw it called it a shrine.

  In a few months, when Frank would have turned 13, Victoria, in what became an annual rite, placed two in memoriams in the New York Daily News. The first was from Frank’s sisters and brothers:

  Frankie Boy. Happy Birthday in Heaven, we miss you so.

  Love, Angel, Vicki, Johnny Boy and Peter Boy.

  The second came from his parents:

  Frankie Boy. We love you always & long to be with you.

  Love & Kisses, Mom & Dad.

  Hundreds of people came to the wake to say good-bye to Frank Gotti. John Favara did not because he was advised by a priest and friends that his presence might be upsetting. Frankie Boy was buried in St. John’s Cemetery in Central Queens.

  FBI agents, who had begun shadowing Gotti—whose parole had not expired—and the Bergin crew a few months before, did not surveil the wake or the funeral. Out of respect.

  “Losing a son is the worst thing that can happen to a man,” said one agent, who recalled that a fellow agent in Queens had lost a son three years earlier. “Gotti probably doesn’t believe it, but out of respect we didn’t [conduct surveillance]. I don’t think anyone did.”

  The NYPD traffic investigators ruled the tragedy an accident, but not everyone saw it the same way.

  Two days after the boy’s death, an unidentified woman called the 106th Precinct and said: “The driver of the car that killed Frank Gotti will be eliminated.”

  Favara found a death threat in his mailbox the same day, but he wasn’t alarmed. “That kind of stuff only happens in movies,” he told a detective who came to warn him about the call.

  The day after the warning, an unidentified woman called the Favara home and made another threat. Two weeks later, Favara’s car was stolen; it was found in another two weeks a mile away in Howard Beach.

  Favara still wasn’t concerned. But then a funeral card and a photograph of Frank Gotti were placed in his mailbox and the word “murderer” was spray-painted on his car.

  John Favara was what he seemed, a mild-mannered family man, but he was friendly with Anthony Zappi, a Gambino soldier. Anthony’s father, Ettore, had been one of Carlo Gambino’s top capos. Anthony Zappi was treasurer of a Teamsters union local that had a contract with Castro Convertible Corporation, Favara’s employer on Long Island. He and Favara grew up in Brooklyn together; though he went one way and Favara another, he was godfather to Favara’s son Scott.

  Favara adored his son, who had slept overnight in the Gotti house. He had tra
nsferred from the sales department of Castro Convertible so he could be with him on Saturdays.

  “His sun rose and set on his son,” Sgt. Gary Schriffen, a Nassau County homicide investigator, would say later.

  Favara asked Zappi what he should do. He told his old connected friend that the threats had to be the pranks of children; he didn’t believe adults would regard Frank Gotti’s death as anything but an accident. Zappi told Favara to move away and get rid of the death car, a vehicle that enraged Victoria Gotti every time she saw it pull up to the house behind hers.

  On May 28, Victoria attacked Favara with a baseball bat. He went to a hospital for treatment, but did not press charges against her. He and his wife Janet then put their house up for sale.

  On July 25, John and Victoria went to Florida. Willie Boy Johnson told Source BQ that Gotti would be gone a week.

  “My wife is still mourning my son and I took her down there to get her mind off things,” Gotti later said. “She’s still on medication.”

  On July 28, John Favara left the Castro Convertible plant at the end of his shift and walked toward his car, which was parked near the adjacent Capitol Diner. He had his eye on a new home in Nassau County and a buyer for his Howard Beach home had come forward. The deal’s closing details would be taken care of in two days.

  As he came near his car, Favara was surprised by a heavyset man who clubbed him with a large piece of wood. The assailant then lifted Favara by the belt of the trousers and threw him into a blue van. A watchman at the Castro plant and several people in the diner saw the abduction. The diner’s owner, Leon Papon, came out of the back door and demanded to know what was going on.

  “Our friend is sick,” the heavyset man replied. “We are taking him home.”

  Another man got out of the van and into a green car that followed the van away from the diner. Both vehicles disappeared down the nearby Jericho Turnpike. Later, a third man drove Favara’s station wagon away.

  Neither John Favara nor his car were ever seen again.

  The next day, Janet Favara reported that her husband was missing. Detectives from 106th Precinct, joined by Nassau County detectives, interviewed the witnesses and scoured the scene for clues. The witnesses identified Favara as the man who had been shoved into the van; a .22-caliber slug and bullet hole were found in a nearby house, at an angle suggesting gunplay during the abduction. Some detectives believe Favara may have started carrying a gun and gotten off a shot before he was overpowered.

  A day later, three burly men visited the diner, sat at the counter and stared at the owner for 15 minutes. Leon Papon stopped talking to cops, sold the diner, and moved away.

  John and Victoria Gotti returned from Florida on August 4. The FBI told Source BQ about the Favara incident the same day, and asked him to find out what he could.

  On August 5, BQ reported back. This memo was placed in his file:

  “Word at the [Bergin] is that the individual responsible for [Frank Gotti’s death] was killed recently at Gotti’s direction and Gotti wanted a solid alibi of not even being in New York at the time this killing took place … Gotti did not initially want revenge … but learned from witnesses [that] the man was speeding and had jumped a stop sign before striking the boy.”

  No one ever told the police that John Favara was speeding or ran a stop sign. “He just didn’t see the kid, he just rolled over him, it was that simple,” Sgt. Schriffen said. What the Bergin men may have been told is another story.

  The memo also said: “Gotti’s wife has been completely distraught since the death of her son and Gotti had promised her revenge …” A subsequent BQ memo added that Favara’s body would never be found.

  Queens and Nassau county detectives—including Sgt. Schriffen—went to the Gotti home a few days later and were invited in by Victoria, dressed in black. She was asked if she knew what had happened to her backyard neighbor.

  “I don’t know what happened to him. I am not sorry if something did. He never sent me a [condolence] card. He never apologized. He never even got his car fixed.”

  Her husband wasn’t home. Sgt. Schriffen asked where he was and what he did for a living.

  “I don’t know where he is. I don’t know what he does. I am an old-fashioned woman. All I know is, he provides.”

  At the Bergin, Gene Gotti told the cops his brother was at his dentist’s office. He said he would call them at the 106th Precinct when John returned.

  Two hours later, Gene called. “My brother will meet with you now,” he said.

  Gotti was dressed in black that day, too. He apologized for having no coffee. He joked that everyone should watch what they said because the Bergin was bugged. He said he had lately been laid off from his job at Arc Plumbing.

  “He was very self-assured,” Schriffen remembered.

  When the discussion turned to Favara, Gotti sounded very much like his wife.

  “I don’t know what happened. I am not sorry if something did happen. He killed my kid.”

  As time wore on, Janet Favara knew her husband wasn’t coming home. But she worried about the safety of her children.

  The detectives tried to give her some peace of mind. They appealed unofficially to Anthony Zappi. Was there some way they might get a tip about where Favara’s body was, so his family could arrange a proper funeral?

  “What happened was Family business,” Zappi said. “It’s over. There will be no more trouble.”

  Detectives believe Favara and his car were compacted into a small block of bones and steel, but no evidence was ever found. In 1986, a court declared him dead.

  At one point, the detectives got a tip that a notorious gang of killers and car thieves known as the “DeMeo crew” was responsible for Favara’s death. The crew was led by Roy DeMeo, who reported to Anthony Gaggi, who was one of Paul Castellano’s top captains.

  The DeMeo crew would be accused of 22 murders, many in connection with a stolen-car racket, for which Castellano was on trial when he was murdered. One victim of the DeMeo crew was hacked to death, after which the killers went out for pizza, one later testified. Another victim was Castellano’s former son-in-law, Frank Amato, who had strayed from Constance Castellano during their marriage and was held responsible for her miscarriage. Amato disappeared a few months after Favara.

  Two years after Favara vanished, a newspaper updated the story and quoted Sgt. Schriffen, who then got a call from an agitated Victoria Gotti, who asked him to stop talking to the press.

  “If my husband knew I was calling you, he’d kill me,” she added. “Let my son die in peace.”

  16

  FORGET ABOUT THIS PHONE

  IN THE FALL OF 1980, the father of the boy on the minibike was gambling heavily and losing big—about $30,000 a weekend, according to Source BQ.

  Gotti beat bookmakers out of many of his losses, but BQ said, “He does not have the money he used to.” Meanwhile, crew members were beginning to grumble about their own financial woes, BQ added.

  Crew associates Tony Roach Rampino, Michael Roccoforte, and the man told by Gotti to set up his son-in-law Tommy DiSimone for murder, Sal DeVita, were identified as “just a few” who were “considering taking action” on their own if Gotti didn’t start arranging scores for them.

  “Source states there is a lot of hard feeling and animosity among members of the club toward Gotti,” Special Agent Colgan wrote.

  Source BQ flatly predicted Gotti and the men closest to him would start dealing drugs in a big way—at the risk of getting killed by Paul Castellano if they got caught by the authorities.

  Gotti would attempt to insulate himself by only putting up investment money, BQ said; Angelo, Gene, and Willie Boy would be more actively involved. BQ cited two bits of circumstantial evidence: Salvatore Ruggiero, with whom Gotti was once arrested in a stolen car, was recently in town and seen by Gotti and Angelo; in addition, a young dealer named Mark Reiter had begun hanging around the Bergin.

  “The informant knows Reiter is heavily invo
lved in the sale and distribution of cocaine,” Agent Colgan wrote. In fact, Reiter would soon be indicted in Manhattan for selling heroin.

  Though Gotti himself would be seduced by the easy money in drugs, he had recently condemned drug dealing, BQ said.

  “Source states Gotti himself has laid the law down to his crew that he will not back them if they are in any way involved [in drug deals], but apparently Gotti was just following orders given him and is not abiding by these same rules.”

  At the time BQ was making his predictions, the Queens District Attorney’s office detective squad was just beginning to investigate John and Angelo. They got underway after learning from Manhattan detectives that the pair hung out on Mulberry Street with Neil Dellacroce.

  Detectives noticed that the men who hung out on 101st Avenue kept walking back and forth between the Bergin and a seemingly empty storefront only 10 feet away. The detectives then noticed that there were two pay telephone booths inside the store.

  A check with the telephone company disclosed that the Bergin itself did not have a phone. New York Telephone records indicated that the name of the subscriber to the storefront phones was Vito Maccia’s Candy Store; but neither Vito nor candy was inside, just a few chairs and the pay telephones along one wall.

  The detectives installed court-approved pen registers, devices that track dialed numbers and count incoming calls. They gave a new name to the phantom candy store: “The telephone room.”

  The registers produced frequently called numbers. One was traced to an apartment in Ridgewood, Queens. Detective Jack Holder, a veteran of many gambling investigations, hid in the hallway outside the apartment. He kept hearing “Hello” without hearing a phone ring. Many bookmakers use phones that announce calls with a light instead of a ring so as not to annoy neighbors.