The Chicago Syndicate: Victoria Gotti Explodes in Court with Profane Tirade

Wednesday, November 04, 2009

Victoria Gotti Explodes in Court with Profane Tirade

She's one bad mother.

Mob matriarch Victoria Gotti unleashed a foul-mouthed fusillade at a federal judge Wednesday, exploding in fury as he booted a purportedly pro-defense juror.

"F----- animals!" screamed the seething mother of defendant John A. (Junior) Gotti. "They're railroading you! They're doing to you what they did to your father!"

Junior Gotti turned from the defense table to soothe his mother, but the wife of late mobster John (Dapper Don) Gotti ignored her 45-year-old son - and escalated her profane tirade.

"They're doing to you what they did to your father," the volatile Mafia mom ranted. "You f------ liar! You bastard!"

Junior interrupted: "I can deal with it. I'm okay. Don't worry about it. I'm fine." But his mother kept blasting with both barrels.

"They're the gangsters, right there!" she yelled. "The f------ gangsters! You son of a bitches! Put your own sons in there. You bastards!"

Federal Judge Kevin Castel was in the middle of dismissing contentious juror No. 7 when Victoria Gotti - who has a history of histrionics - sprung from her seat in full maternal meltdown.

She was hustled from the courtroom by three of her children before a scowling Castel continued, cutting loose the pro-defense juror. Prosecutors had sought her dismissal.

He also dismissed No. 7's nemesis, juror No. 11. The jury was out of the courtroom when Castel made his ruling - and when Victoria Gotti erupted.

"I don't know the source of the friction between the two jurors," Castel concluded after Victoria Gotti left. "It may be that one is a difficult personality or that both are difficult.

"Accordingly, I am striking both jurors."

The blowup came as the defense was wrapping up its case in Gotti's fourth racketeering trial in five years. The first three ended with hung juries and mistrials.

The jury rift opened last week, after a letter to the judge from an anonymous fellow panelist.

The juror ratted out No. 7, a 34-year-old mail carrier, as sweet on defense lawyer Charles Carnesi and giving her "undivided attention" to the defense case.

The letter raised hopes in the Gotti camp of a fourth mistrial. Then more problems emerged this week, with juror No. 11 accusing No. 7 of taunting her.

Castel attempted to calm the divided jury with sweet talk and sweets - a jar of Twizzlers. Neither worked. And nothing could calm Victoria Gotti, who had verbally assaulted Castel after a hearing in May.

"Why don't you hang him now?" she asked sarcastically at the time. "These are the good guys? God help us!"

Three years ago, in another Junior trial, she shouted at a federal prosecutor. "Who the hell do you think you're talking to?" she snapped.

Thanks to Alison Gendar and Larry McShane.

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