I don't necessarily agree. sure guys in his crew weren't confrontational but Gotti wasn't this guy who was feared by everyone...thats for sure.

the guys in the gambino family were ,for sure they kissed his ass,other families have their own boss to fear like chim ,vic gas, ect.i was not speaking for all of cosa nostra

Hey Bronx love your stuff you post on here and BH. I just had a question about Jojo and Johns relationship. Did he keep him close to kind of seperate him from Nicky or did he actually enjoy his presence? By all accounts he seemed like a miserable dude.

If u look at the guys around Gotti, he didn’t surround himself with absolutely anybody “within his circle”

The guys that were with him daily being Jackie, Pete, Bobby, jojo were all very subservient personality wise

U see he couldn’t have a strong personality or guys who were born leaders like himself to be within his circle. There’ll be a clash of personalities

Jojo was a tough guy but they didn’t call him miserable for nothing- and seems like a quiet guy

Jackie was his runaround guy/ Pete the same despite being his older brother

Gene, now he was very headstrong and similar to John in a lot of ways but u wouldn’t see him being one of Gotti’s butlers

Bobby again was a big friendly type giant and very loyal but tough when needed to be

These are also the guys he would trust enough to invite to his house if that makes sense

hello Hardy, john liked jojo. john also made lil nick a captain..

well said Tony, `you can add jackie the actor and joe watts to your list those were his night life guys

thank you Hardy,

What about Tony Lee? He was on trial with Gotti. Where did he fit in? I'm pretty sure that the trial that they were co defendants in, was one that was fixed. Did he end up having to have a re trial after Gravano testified? When I see all the reruns of these guys, it seems like Gotti is the least intelligent of them all. He didn't have one racket that he pioneered. He killed the boss and that was it.

smart people do stupid things , Blue, he was very smart,ego was his poison.tony lee good guy ,they were found not guilty

Come on Bronx Gotti wasn't intelligent lol. Tough? Yes Had balls? For sure but definetly was not the sharpest tool in the toolshed. He wasn't a particularly good earner at least not as good as most other crews. He was a degenerate gambler who pissed away all his crew profits so they had to resort to drug dealing. Lets be honest without Neil he wouldn't have gotten very far and as respected as Neil was he wasnt a smart gangster either which is part of the reason carlo passed him over. One thing I do agree with you about is his ego. Just listening to the prison tapes shows you have high of a opinion he has of himself and how he acts like he is so much smarter than everybody else when in reality he was a moron

Agreed. Frank Decicco would have been a better choice. I bet if Frank never gotten blown up they would have probably gotten rid of Gotti within year

lol hello JC, we agree on almost everything you said, John was not smart but intelligent, extremely well read, very witty, look at the news everyday, you have brilliant minds doing the most dumb things to ruin their lives.. killing paul dumbest thing he could do, talk in that apt. in clubs ect, john wanted his image to be , me work? me open a biz? john gotti does non of that ,it is for soft guys, all ego, john could talk about anything and if he didn't know ,he would find out, im talking non mob related topics, he and his crew were a disaster for C.N. you can throw in , he believed in CN .... until it appied to him and his people, then all bets off.he gambled and lost his money and peoples lives and lost everytime..

frank was never going to be able to make a deal if john got killed first, he was paul's betrayer, first ,foremost.. without frank john can't get away with killing paul.. frank was extremely respected in the gambino's and every other family..my opinion JC

Eh He definetly wasn't smart or well read. FBI Agent Joe Coffey once said of Gotti "He had the vocabulary of a sailor, no imagination, Every word was F or MF or CS, it was unreal...he was a moron" Hilarious but true quote

coffey was drunk everyday, he would go up to Elaine's in NYC ,he was at the bar slurring all over everytime he was there, he def hated gotti, i don't think gotti liked him to much, bad filthy mouth has nothing to do with smart ,not smart, john always wanted to sound gruff, baratonish voice, i respect your opinion ,we will both stay with our positions..

No offense but did you know Gotti personally? How do you know he was so smart? I admit I didn't know him but have done research on him for like over many years and from everything I have seen from people who knew or encountered him he defnetly wasn't smart. I'm not saying he was a total dummy( he obviously knew the streets and knew how to get guys to follow him) but smart is not a word I would ever put along with gotti lol

o.k.

not sure what that was about.

easy.. like i stated you have yours i have mine, I'm not here to try and change your mind at all, just giving you and all my input , how many times could we go back and forth saying the same thing, i respect your opinion.nothing more or less, that is what these boards are about, if we all said and thought the same, how boring would that be, we would have all the answers and no need to ask questions. hopes that helps JC.

Just relax man. I wasn't trying to change your opinion

again , you missed it, i said i was not trying to change your mind or anyone else, on this topic nobody can change my mind, I'm always relaxed JC thats why i come on here to relax even further. any more relaxed my wife will have to take my pulse and see if im alive..just trying to give input, like with coffey, i gave you some insight as to what he was like and were he hung out acting a fool with the rich and impressionable. and yes i did see him there several times..im old and have a few bucks

i didnt miss anything. First off i wasnt talking about coffey, i just brought up a quote he made which was pretty accurate. Obviously you dont like him which is fine.

last post on this topic for me..JC, you said you were not trying to change my opinion, ..right, that is not what i wrote i said i respect yours and i am not here to change yours or anyones..you used coffee as a 100% accurate reference. no? or yes? , and he did say that you are correct, so you used that guy as fact, i said he is a blowhard loud mouth that the detectives hated him..once you use him .my point is he is not the last say on gotti, thats all. if you want to believe him as fact, fine ..that is your right..hope you understand what I'm trying to type.. absolutley did not respect him..

i NEVER said he was my main reference. I simply used his quote because many others have said similar things about gotti. I can tell you are starting to get a bit oversenitive. You seemed to misinterpret what i said

o.k..any other topic we can go to.

no need for sarcasm.

Sure pick ANY topic you want and i will discuss

Gotti might not have had the academic background of a Law student but he sure as heck wasn’t stupid. Yes he did make a fatal error (playing up to the media), and talking too much but all criminals make mistakes from time to time even the best

Gravano 99.9% of the time slates Gotti but he remarked how smart Gotti was. Now that’s not to say Gotti was a business minded individual, perhaps Gravano was referring to how smart he is in general

I previously posted a video of that Irish guy who did time at MCC/ who is a producer now and he pretty much said the same thing.

As for being stupid for trying to be all over the news, who knows perhaps he did that to keep himself safe. I bet without the media constantly being around- Vic Gas & the West Side would have got to him much sooner/ not implying he didn’t enjoy the attention, he DID!

Scarfo said he was very sharp too. That’s the opposite of stupid

lmao that was me. it was on 3rd avenue near 85th street outside of the Chipotle. i was walking home from work and walked right by him, all i heard in passing was him saying "ill tell ya, hanging out with john gotti......" and didnt hear the rest. looking back , its kinda weird he said Gotti's full name instead of just "hanging out with John..."

he looked like he barely aged from all those pics you see him in wirh Gotti from the 80s / 90s. definitely didnt look like he was in bad shape.

i know he used to live right up there on 86th street back in the day. when i saw him it was about 2 years ago. i wonder if hes back living up in that neighborhood again

There is a big misconception regarding Gotti’s intelligence. Same with Scarfo.
Everyone is born with a special talent. Gotti had a natural ability to lead. Thats really what it boils down to. Most people dont have that quality.
He probably had average to above average intelligence. But who knows, he never took the SAT exam.
He was not dumb, thats for sure. People naturally gravitated towards him, he had that gift. Those who have that gift arent dumb.
Let me ask you guys this.. the United States put all their resources into arresting one guy ( Gotti ). Do you really think he would of never been arrested if he wasnt so high profile??? Maybe he would of been on the streets another year, if it wasnt gravano who flipped, it would of been someone else. You have to remember, the gambino’s were the biggest and most profitable family at that time. There is no way you can bring in that kind of money without the feds targeting you.
It boiled down to this.. the FBI against one guy.. who wins??