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Howard Beach’s Jr. Gotti stabbed on Long Island

Howard Beach’s Jr. Gotti stabbed on Long Island
AP Photo/Evan Agostini
By Philip Newman

The Nassau County district attorney’s office has taken over the investigation of an attack on John A. “Junior” Gotti, the former Gambino crime family chief, who showed up at a Long Island hospital after suffering a stab wound in the abdomen in what he said was an attempt to break up a fight.

“The case is now being handled by the district attorney’s office,” a spokeswoman for the Nassau County Police Department said.

Syosett Hospital reported to police that Gotti arrived at the hospital shortly before 10 p.m. Sunday and said he was stabbed when he tried to stop a fight between strangers in the parking lot of a CVS Pharmacy in Syosett. The wound was not life-threatening.

Sources in the Nassau Police Department said they doubted the story and found the 49-year-old Gotti “uncooperative” when they questioned him.

Gotti’s home is in Oyster Bay, L.I., although he was brought up in Howard Beach.

He is the son of notorious mobster John Joseph “Dapper Don” Gotti Jr., head of the Gambino crime family, and Victoria Di Gorgio Gotti, who still lives in Howard Beach. The elder Gotti was sentenced to life imprisonment and died in 2002 in the U.S. Prison Hospital in Springfield, Mo.

Junior Gotti pleaded guilty to charges of loansharking, bookmaking and extortion and was sentenced to 77 months in prison and released in 2005.

Gotti was then tried in Manhattan federal court three times on charges of racketeering and murder but each trial ended in a hung jury. He has repeatedly claimed that he left the mob life behind.

Reach contributing writer Philip Newman by e-mail at timesledgernews@cnglocal.com or phone at 718-260-4536.