Quitting the Mob and Living To Tell the Tale

This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.

The New York Sun

Once upon a time, a college-educated mob prince thwarted Manhattan federal prosecutors in a blockbuster racketeering case and thumbed his nose at his Mafia heritage. He then moved far away from New York and the clutches of its feared five families, and lived happily ever after with his wife and children.

No, this is not a fairy tale based on the life of John “Junior” Gotti, who could do something similar in coming months if the Manhattan U.S. attorney’s office, as expected, dismisses a still-pending racketeering indictment against him.

In fact, the unlikely scenario is the real-life saga of the Yuppie Don, Michael Franzese, a multimillionaire mobster scam artist who quit the mob 18 years ago and has made a cottage industry out of his resignation.

It’s hard to imagine a better illustration than Michael Franzese for the proposition espoused by Junior Gotti: There may be a Mafia axiom against quitting the mob, but members of powerful New York crime families have shown they can do it and not only live to enjoy it, but prosper in their new, straight lives.

In recent years, Franzese, a son of legendary Colombo capo John “Sonny” Franzese, has literally gotten religion. He has lectured about the evils of gambling and other organized crime activities to many groups, including small town police departments, big-time college football teams, law schools, conferences of the American Football Coaches Association, and professional football, basketball, and baseball players.

Four years ago, he caused quite a stir when he alleged that in the 1970s and 1980s he had induced unnamed members of the Yankees with gambling debts to fix games rather than make their payments. The charges were denied by the Yankees and Major League Baseball. Numerous teams still use Franzese during spring training to alert players of the dangers of gambling and organized crime.

Franzese, 52, who broke his vow of omerta in the late 1980s, implicated his father — who, at age 89, is still the underboss of the crime family, sources say — and scores of others in criminal activities, but never testified against any wiseguys or mob associates along the way.

On his Web site, he promotes his books — five bucks extra for an autographed copy — and promotes himself as a born-again Christian who can alert any number of different audiences about the evils of the mob. He also relates how a prison guard and a pretty 19-year-old dancer he fell in love with at age 30, and later married, helped him find redemption.

The site, michaelfranzese.com, contains praise from several satisfied customers, including the CEO of a software company and an executive with the NFL’s San Diego Chargers, Ron George.

When defense lawyer Charles Carnesi took over Gotti’s defense following his first trial, he spoke to Franzese about “quitting the mob,” which is the title of the first of two books he has written about his mobster days and his escape from that life.

Mr. Carnesi stressed to Gang Land that his client had no intention of going down the same road as Franzese.

“We believed he would be an excellent example for the notion that you can quit the mob, even if you’re not disposed to be a cooperating witness,” Mr. Carnesi said. Like Franzese, Mr. Carnesi said, his client is the son of a powerful gangster, attended college, and had no intention of taking the stand against his former cohorts.

The attorney said Franzese — who was in Waco, Texas, on Monday giving professors and law school students at Baylor University “a unique opportunity to see another side of the law,” according to the school’s newspaper — spoke eloquently about the inherent danger of quitting the mob. He drove home the point, Mr. Carnesi said, that while the Mafia has a rule against it, individuals can opt to break it, if they choose to live with the dire consequences that could result.

“Obviously there’s a rule, but like all rules they can be broken,” Mr. Carnesi said. “Michael talked about it very effectively: ‘Sure you could be in danger, but it’s not as if you are not in danger if you stayed in the life, where guys sitting in the front seat get shot in the back of the head by guys sitting in the back seat. If they want to kill me now, they can’t get my best friend to call me to a meeting.'”

“He spoke to us at length and was extremely cooperative,” Mr. Carnesi said. “He said, ‘If I’m subpoenaed, I’ll be there.’ We decided not to call him when the government moved away from the absolute stance they took in the first trial, that you cannot quit. Obviously you can quit if you are willing to accept the risk of whatever consequences result.”

Like Franzese, Mr. Carnesi said, “John has assumed that risk.”

Gang Land reached the ex-Yuppie Don yesterday at Birmingham International Airport following a talk at the University of Alabama. Franzese confirmed that he reluctantly agreed to testify, even though he feared his appearance might antagonize the FBI as well as his former wiseguy friends. “You never skate away from this thing 100%,” he said.

Franzese recalled: “I wasn’t thrilled with it, but I said, ‘If John is for real’ (And why wouldn’t he be? It’s no surprise that anyone in his right mind would want to leave the life. I believe it.) I said, ‘If I’m subpoenaed, I’ll come in.'”

Franzese, who pleaded guilty to racketeering charges in Brooklyn 20 years ago, forfeited $5 million, agreed to cooperate, and then reneged, serving about seven years in prison before his release in the early 1990s. Two years ago, according to court records, the feds placed a lien on proceeds from his second book, “Blood Covenant,” citing a $10 million fine that hasn’t been satisfied.

Franzese declined to disclose the unpaid balance or a payout schedule that he has worked out with the government, but he doesn’t really expect to pay it off.

“I hope I do,” he said with a chuckle. “That would mean I’ve been pretty successful.” Franzese left unsaid that it would also mean that he had avoided, by hook or by crook, the stated punishment of death for violating the sacred Mafia oath of omerta.

Prosecutors Victor Hou and Miriam Rocah declined to discuss the finer points of their case, including the notion of voluntary mob retirement. A FBI spokesman, Jim Margolin, insisted that the feds haven’t changed their mind. “It’s no secret that the government’s position at all three trials, and it hasn’t changed since, was that John A.”Junior” Gotti had not quit the mob,” he said.

Meanwhile, Gotti lawyer Seth Ginsberg is preparing motion papers seeking to dismiss the racketeering indictment and prevent the government from bringing Gotti to trial a fourth time. Under a schedule set by trial judge Shira Scheindlin, Mr. Ginsberg will file his papers on October 11, unless the U.S. attorney’s office throws the case out before then.

This column and other news of organized crime will appear later today at ganglandnews.com.


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