Informants say Junior Gotti Colluded Legal Defense with Vinny Gorgeous
U.S. District Court Judge Kevin Castel ruled yesterday that prosecutors "will be allowed to present testimony Wednesday that Gotti and Bonanno family boss Vincent Basciano colluded in 2004 to construct legal defenses that they had withdrawn from the mob" as reported by John Riley for Newsday:
[The judge] will allow two informants - Gambino family soldier Joseph D'Angelo and Bonanno family capo Dominick Cicale - to testify that Gotti and Basciano told them they had consulted on the plan. "We need to come up with a new way of defending," prosecutor Elie Honig quoted Gotti as telling D'Angelo in a jailhouse conversation after he and Gotti were indicted in a racketeering conspiracy in 2004. Both informants, Honig said, will testify that they were assured that admitting the mob's existence had been cleared, and that by denying they had engaged in crime for five years they would fall outside the statute of limitations on racketeering. "Don't worry about it," Honig said Basciano told Cicale. "I've discussed it with John Gotti Junior, and Junior's going to have Joey D'Angelo do the same type of thing." * * * Castel's ruling, not unexpected, came after a day in which prosecutors played a series of 2003 prison tapes in which Gotti rants about his disgust with the treachery of gang life as a lawyer describes the need to "plant the seeds" for the legal claim that he has withdrawn from organized crime.
Junior's former driver and a one-time Bonanno family capo will testify beginning today that Gotti's claim of Mafia retirement is a ruse designed to beat his racketeering case. Joseph (Little Joey) D'Angelo will appear first, saying Gotti told him in July 2004 that the way to beat any mob rap was through the "withdrawal defense." Dominick Cicale will follow, testifying that he heard the same thing about Junior that year during a conversation with now-jailed Bonanno boss Vincent (Vinny Gorgeous) Basciano. The timing is crucial to the government case. The feds must prove that Gotti's criminal activities with the Gambino family continued through 2003 - or Junior can beat the case through the statute of limitations. Gotti, 45, facing his fourth trial in five years, says he quit the mob a decade ago.Further reporting:
Newsday: John Gotti's fulminations
Daily News: Mob rats describe other side of Jr. Gotti
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