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Gotti Prosecutors Cite Secret Guilty Plea In Other Mob Case

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By JOSH POLTILOVE | The Tampa Tribune
and ELAINE SILVESTRINI | The Tampa Tribune

Published: December 10, 2008

About seven months before John "Junior" Gotti and four other men were arrested on racketeering charges, a defendant in another mob case secretly pleaded guilty, prosecutors announced today.

John E. Alite, described during a trial as the leader of a crew that committed crimes in New York, New Jersey and Florida, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit racketeering, documents show.

Prosecutors say Alite led a Gambino crime family crew that for a time fought to control the Tampa area valet parking business.

Alite, who briefly attended the University of Tampa in the early 1980s, was named in an indictment in another Gambino case that resulted in convictions of four defendants including Ronald "Ronnie One Arm" Trucchio, a captain in the Gambino crime family. Alite fled to Brazil before that 2006 trial and was extradited.

During the Trucchio trial, a witness, Kevin Bonner, described Alite as Gotti's right-hand man in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

Under Alite's guilty plea, which was entered in January and unsealed today, the 46-year-old man faces a maximum sentence of life in prison, a $250,000 fine and five years of supervised release.

A federal judge in New York ordered the government to unseal the information in connection with prospective government witnesses for a mob trial in January.

One of the Gambino defendants arrested along with Gotti in August, James Cadicamo, has said in an interview that a prosecutor told his attorney that Alite is cooperating with the government.

Reporter Josh Poltilove can be reached at (813) 259-7691 or jpoltilove@tampatrib.com.

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