Pete Gotti is seen as the defacto head of the Gambino La Cosa Nostra (LCN) Family. Originally a gopher and courier for his famous brother, shuttling tribute to him on the weekends from crews. He later managed the Bergin Hunt & Fish Social Club of Ozone Park, Queens, which served as his original headquarters and later as his office.
Pete Gotti had originally surprised mob watchers and law enforcement. He proved much less talkative, preferring to meet irregularly and rarely in public. However this former sanitation employee has since been snagged in two serious indictments. The first involved a shakedown on action film actor Steven Seagal. The second is the extortion of container facilities and labor racketeering involving the ILA union on the Brooklyn waterfront. He was indicted along with capo Sonny Ciccone. His subsequent indictment and refusal by American justice to grant him bail, prevented him from attending his brother's public funeral in July 2002.
Peter Gotti is the last of the Gotti brothers on the streets. He was once a city sanitation employee until an injury allowed him to collect disability and devote his time to La Cosa Nostra. Tried and acquitted in the "Windows Case", brother Pete became a collector of profits on behalf of his brother and became more active in day to day criminal affairs. When his nephew John "Junior" was convicted for racketeering in 2000, Uncle Pete stepped up and took over as acting boss. Originally seen as not so bright he has proven himself capable and effective. He still calls the Bergen Hunt Fish Social Club of Ozone Park, Queens his homebase. He occasionally stops by but has desperately tried to avoid the spotlight which plagued his brother John during his brief and public time as criminal head.
John "Junior" Gotti:
John "Junior" Gotti was not like his father in several ways. He was privy to the ill gotten spoils as the son of a top earning Gambino capo and later boss. He had completed high school and was raised in the respectable Queens neighborhood of Howard Beach. This was unlike his father who never even made it to junior high and was raised in near poverty conditions of Brooklyn. The younger Gotti donned sweatsuits not the Italian suits that were so prominently a part of his father's wardrobe.
Upon being "made", he was given capo status. His crew was mainly younger Gambino soldiers, often considered reckless and he too preferred to make the rounds of Manhattan as one. He would be the executive of a trucking company, although appears to have never worked an honest day's work in his life and was later building his own portfolio. The younger Gotti would rely on loansharking and bookmaking, funneling profits into the now defunct Club Boca of Boca Raton, FL and several property holdings in the sunshine state. It should be noted that two unsolved murders in both Deerfield Beach and Boca Raton, with ties to the Gambino LCN Family, would occur during "Junior's" tenure.
Upon his father's 1992 conviction a rotating panels of capos would act as boss and leader of the Gambino crime family. As a result of turncoat underboss Sammy Gravano, most would cop pleas in fear of his testimony. The younger Gotti and his uncle Peter would fill the role as the new leaders. With this, law enforcement began to step up their investigation on him and his uncle.
When the FBI raided his home, an estimated $358,000 from his wedding purse was found, along with a list of mobsters who attended, the amounts they gave and respective family affiliation. In addition there was guns and a list of recently inducted Lucchese LCN family soldiers. The younger Gotti took a plea on racketeering charges in 1999, unlike his father who fought and lost.
Mob bump...fogetaboutit