Words that Federal Judge Frederic Block uttered before the waterfront racketeering trial of Gambino boss Peter Gotti began are hanging over the case like a dark cloud as it winds down with evidence of loansharking and gambling by lesser defendants. 

Four months ago, when Block was visibly upset the feds were keeping Gotti segregated from other inmates despite the Judge’s order that he be placed in general population, Block voiced the hope that Gotti and his codefendants would win an acquittal. 

“We have gone through all the pros and cons already about setting an early trial date,” the Judge bristled when prosecutor Andrew Genser asked Block to reconsider a Jan 6. trial date and schedule the trial for February.  

“We don’t have to repeat ourselves,” said Block. “These gentlemen are entitled to hopefully have a jury say, ‘Not guilty.’ ”

And while his wistful remarks in October won’t carry any weight with the jurors who will decide Gotti’s fate, several of his trial rulings will certainly make it easier for the jury to acquit Gotti of money laundering and other charges stemming from the Gambino family’s control of the Brooklyn and Staten Island docks.

By themselves, none of the rulings knocks the prosecution out of the box

completely. But together – and Gang Land makes no assertion Block has made them to fulfill his stated “hope” – they give Gotti a much better chance to beat the case than even members of the defense team had expected.

Block has prohibited the prosecution from calling turncoat Genovese associate Michael (Cookie) D’Urso to testify about joint family waterfront scams and several discussions in which Genovese gangsters identified Peter Gotti as the Gambino boss.

The judge did not allow FBI agent Greg Hagarty to testify that informants have identified Gotti as family boss or that his brother Gene said as much in coded jailhouse conversations that were played for the jury.

Block’s most damaging ruling, and hardest to fathom, stopped prosecutors from playing a tape recording in which defendant Jerome Brancato, (left) a soldier charged with taking regular extortion payoffs to Gotti, admitted involvement in crimes for which he is on trial.

The conversation took place on May 12, 2000, during the middle of federal probes into waterfront racketeering by the Gambino and Genovese families after the Genovese family asked for help in locating a corrupt union official in an unrelated scam.

“I thought it was the waterfront. I wish it was the waterfront … I got two guys in

there,” said Brancato, apologizing that he did not know anyone in the target union.

While the omission certainly helps Brancato, it also serves Gotti’s interests since the feds introduced evidence – including videotapes – that Brancato drove to Howard Beach, Queens for clandestine meetings with Gotti eight times between October 2000 and May 2001, allegedly to deliver cash payoffs from waterfront extortion scams.

Their Jan. 23, 2001 meeting was typical – not far from Gotti’s home and on a Tuesday night. Brancato parked his car, exited carrying a shopping bag, entered Gotti’s car for a brief visit-ride around the block, then returned to his car empty handed and drove off.

No matter what the jury ultimately decides, the verdict will be similar and at the same time different than a prior verdict in one Gotti case or another since there have been so many since John Gotti burst on the scene as the Dapper Don in 1985.

John Gotti beat three cases, was later found guilty and sentenced to life in prison, where he died last year. Brother Gene had two mistrials before being convicted of heroin dealing and sentenced to 50 years. Junior Gotti was acquitted of assault then pleaded guilty to racketeering. And Peter was acquitted of labor racketeering in 1991.

Whatever the jury decides about guilt or innocence, though, no one will ever accuse Peter Gotti, a onetime sanitation worker, of being a Dapper Don. 

When George Barone was about to go to prison for labor racketeering in 1983, he jumped at the chance to do a favor for Vincent (Chin) Gigante and help his son Andrew. After all, Chin was the boss, and Barone, a college educated gangster, knew that in the mob, it's always a good idea to please the boss.

So Barone put in a good word for Andrew with Bert Guido, the head of Metropolitan Marine Maintenance Association, an employer's association that worked hand-in-glove with the mob, according to FBI reports obtained by Gang Land.

But there are limits, says Barone, the 79-year-old turncoat mobster and former top official of the International Longshoremen’s Association who ran a powerful ILA local for the Genovese family for decades.

In 1998, Andrew and Guido were partners in a container repair company looking for work in Miami and Barone was the Genovese family's man on the Miami piers. With Chin in prison for labor racketeering, Andrew made his own overtures to Barone seeking labor peace in a new contract their company had just obtained.

Barone agreed to give the boss’s son a free ride, on condition that Andrew convince Guido to pay a $90,000 debt he owed Barone since the early 1980's.

When February 2000 rolled around and Guido hadn’t made good on his debt –

and both he and Andrew ignored his calls even though their company had made over $400,000 in 1999 – Barone unleashed his men.

Before long, Guido showed up with a belated $3000 Christmas gift from Andrew that further infuriated Barone, who was looking for $90,000.

"Take this back to New York and tell Andrew to stick it up his ass," he told Guido.

That didn’t sit too well with Andrew. As his labor problems mounted and profits declined, he flew to Miami and left angrier than when he arrived. Barone told him again to shove it and to “go back and tell your father.” 

Barone wanted his $90,000 and wasn’t going to back down, he explained to FBI agents Michael Campi and Joy Adam, even though Andrew “didn’t believe he had to have Guido pay this debt because he was the son of the boss.” 

Barone got his way, sort of.  

Genovese soldier Pasquale (Patty) Falcetti – a codefendant of Vincent and Andrew in their waterfront racketeering trial that starts next month – soon delivered $45,000 to Barone, promising to bring the balance in March 2001. 

A few weeks later, when Falcetti called and said he couldn’t make the trip but had $45,000 waiting for Barone in New York, the cagy career criminal figured his debt would be paid in lead instead of cash. He stayed put in Miami. When the feds nailed him for racketeering, he was quick to jump ship.

Mob Star: The Story of John Gotti

Mob Star: The Story of John Gotti – the book it took yours truly and Gene Mustain 17 years to do – tells the complete saga of John Gotti, from his treacherous rise to his defiant downfall. Although we didn't know it at the time, we began working on "Mob Star" 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 2002. We added a postscript, and Alpha Books has distributed it to the nation's bookstores.

With a 40,000-word update, the new edition contains the entire Gotti saga right 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. 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.