Edward Garafola, a longtime Gambino soldier, is the latest career gangster (joining Joseph Watts and Alphonse Persico) to be hit with heavy duty charges as he was about to get out of federal prison. Garafola, 65, can only hope he fares better than Watts and Persico, who were convicted and earned more hard time.

Garafola (right) parted company with brother-in-law Salvatore (Sammy Bull) Gravano a decade ago, but is now in the same Manhattan federal lockup facing much the same fate – a virtual life sentence behind bars.

Manhattan Federal Judge Richard Conway Casey has ruled that Garafola, who completes a five month prison term on Sept. 27 for extortion, is a danger to society and a threat to flee. He ordered Garafola to remain jailed as he awaits trial for murder conspiracy.

Garafola, who had been implicated in four other mob hits by Gravano, was the catalyst who propelled Sammy Bull to turn on John Gotti and the Gambino family in the fall of 1991, according to Gravano, whose account has been confirmed by several law enforcement sources. 

“Comes October and I'm still not even thinking of cooperating,” Gravano said in “Underboss,” a book about his murderous life. “It’s my whining brother-in-law Eddie, a whining motherfucker all my life, who puts the idea in my head. He's

caused me nothing but trouble with his devious ways, always looking for the angle. A couple of guys in my crew wanted to whack him. ‘You can't trust him,’ they said. But he's got a big edge with me. His wife is my sister and I ain’t ever going to hurt her, even though he’s treating her like shit."

Garafola broached the idea of cooperating while Gravano was locked up in the Metropolitan Correctional Center, the same place they both reside now. Back then, however, Garafola was visiting his underboss brother-in-law who was awaiting trial with Gotti for racketeering and murder.  

“So now he comes in for a visit, whining one more time with that crying voice, ‘Sammy, you’re going down on this case.’

“I said, ‘What do you suggest Eddie?’ 

“He says, 'I hate to say this Sammy, but maybe you should cooperate. I'll go with you. Me and you cooperate and we'll go into a whole other life. Take our families and run after it's over....We'll make another life, Sammy.'"

Gravano contacted the feds, but his brother-in-law double crossed him, wrote Gravano. “You know, it's like when you're kids standing by the edge of the pool, and it’s one, two three, jump! Schmucko jumped, and he didn't.” 

Garafola, along with Gambino capos Louis (Big Lou) Vallario and Michael (Mikey Scars) DiLeonardo, is facing life, charged with conspiring to murder

Staten Island businessman Fred Weiss, a sanitation magnate whom Gotti feared was getting ready to talk. But they couldn't get the job done, said prosecutor Michael McGovern. They stalked him, even dug a grave, but were unable to lure him to the garage where they had planned to kill him.  

So, Gotti called in a favor and the New Jersey-based DeCavalcante family – the dysfunctional mob crew that considers itself the real-life model for The Sopranos, HBO’s fictional family that returns for its fourth season on Sunday – killed Weiss in front of his home. 

Three DeCavalcante wiseguys, including two who took part in the hit, are set to testify against Garafola and company, (Vallario, left; DiLeonardo, right) who steadfastly proclaim their innocence, and, say their lawyers, expect to prevail at trial. Garafola’s attorney Michael Rosen, who is considering whether to appeal Casey’s detention ruling, said Gravano was "an insidious, sick and demented liar (who) has shown that his words are worthless.” 

Meanwhile, Gravano, 57, got 20 years for drug dealing last week as prosecutors Linda Lacewell and Noah Perlman prevailed on Brooklyn Federal Judge Alynne Ross to give him 4.5 years above the usual maximum called for by the sentencing guidelines. 

As sentence was pronounced, Gravano, who declined to say anything on his behalf, turned to his lawyer and said: “It’s a good thing she couldn’t give me more than 20 years.”

Good for you, Sammy, but not so great for the rest of us.

The feds have evidence that John Gotti's brothers and son were plotting to kill the warden of the prison where the Dapper Don died, but a federal judge says they don’t have enough evidence to keep Peter Gotti in solitary confinement. 

Peter, (right) Gene (left) and Junior were placed in “the hole” of their respective prisons on Aug. 16 after the FBI learned that the Gottis had “approved a plan to murder” warden Bill Hedrick, who was warden at Marion Federal Penitentiary while Gotti was there in the mid 1990’s and was warden at the prison hospital in Springfield, Mo. when Gotti died, of cancer, according to court papers.

Peter, awaiting trial for waterfront racketeering, his brother and nephew have been held in solitary confinement 23 hours a day with virtually no contact with the outside world in an effort to stymie the plan as the FBI and prison authorities investigate the allegations. 

The plan, said prosecutors Andrew Genser and Katya Jestin, also called for the plotters to kill, “if necessary, the warden’s family, in order to exact revenge for the perceived mistreatment of John Gotti by the warden.” 

Peter Gotti denies knowledge of any plot.

The prosecutors argued that the Bureau of Prisons had the right to segregate Peter Gotti to prevent him from sending messages to others in the plot to kill Hedrick. 

But after a closed door hearing, Brooklyn Federal Judge Frederic Block ruled that Peter's confinement was punitive and excessive, and on Tuesday evening, ordered him returned to general population. (The ruling has no effect on Gene Gotti, currently in a federal facility in Oklahoma, or on Junior Gotti, an inmate in upstate New York.)

Block refused to suspend his ruling while prosecutors appeal, but late yesterday, the Second Circuit Court of Appeals stayed Block's ruling and Peter was back in the hole in the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn to await further pre-trial proceedings in the case.

Mob Star: The Story of John Gotti

Hot off the presses! It's here, the book it took yours truly and Gene Mustain 17 years to do! Although we didn't know it at the time, we began working on Mob Star: The Story of John Gotti in 1985, when we began covering the Gotti story as news reporters.

The first edition came out in 1988, and we finished this new edition three days before Gotti died in June. Alpha Books has distributed it to the nation's bookstores.

With a 40,000-word update, the new edition contains the entire Gotti saga – from his treacherous rise to his defiant downfall and right on up to his time in prison and his death from throat cancer.

The 378 page, full-size book uses eight additional chapters, a prologue and an epilogue to complete the story we began telling (better than any other reporters, we might add!) when we covered the Gotti-orchestrated, midtown Manhattan assassination of former Gambino boss Paul Castellano.

For the last and best words on Gotti, this is the book to have. It is specially priced at Amazon.com at $11.87, more than five bucks off the suggested retail price.

Not Really For Idiots

Whether you're a Gang Land regular or an occasional visitor, you'll enjoy  "The Complete Idiot's Guide to The Mafia," a book I wrote for Alpha Books that was published in December. It's filled with real stuff about real wiseguys and insight about the ways that mobsters make their money. It's 343 pages of true stories of life and death, honor and betrayal. Get it at your local book store, or at Gang Land's favorite, Amazon.com, where the powers that be have knocked the price down to $13.27, so low I am concerned that the Godfather of online booksellers has forgotten about my end.