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Judge Deciding Gotti Venue Questions Serial Prosecutions

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By KEITH MORELLI | The Tampa Tribune

Published: November 20, 2008

TAMPA - Attorneys for John A. "Junior" Gotti argued today that prosecutors — who were unable to secure convictions in three New York City racketeering trials — have unfairly moved the organized crime case to Tampa and asked that it be returned to New York.

Prosecutors said the Florida indictment charges Gotti with felonies committed here, including laundering money from illegal drug sales, and that Tampa is a fitting location for his trial, scheduled tentatively for April.

U.S. District Judge Steven D. Merryday heard arguments back and forth for two hours this morning and took the matter under advisement. He said he would issue a written ruling "in short order," but likely wouldn't be today.

The judge said he had to decide whether holding the trial here, with most of the same evidence and witnesses that testified in the three New York trials - each ending in hung juries - goes against the "the interests of justice." He also was asked to consider the fairness of having Gotti's attorney, who lives in New York as do most of the defense witnesses, flown here and put up for open-ended trips, all at the expense of the Gotti family.

Merryday said 95 percent of the Tampa indictment mirrored the New York indictment, first issued in 2004, except for "some local color," and he asked prosecutors whether it was fundamentally fair for them to "serially prosecute" the case from one city to the next until they got a conviction.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Jay Trezevant said the government has the right to protect its citizens in any jurisdiction and that Gotti visited Tampa in the 1980s and 1990s to plan and carry out the Gambino crime family's illegal business, which included drug trafficking, murder and witness tampering.

Trezevant, who is based in Tampa, said Gotti headed an effort by the Gambinos to gain a foothold in the Tampa Bay area in the late 1980s.

"He came to Tampa to plant a Gambino crime family flag," Trezevant said.

At first, the plan was to take over the valet parking business and then invest in businesses and property across the state.

But Merryday countered by asking whether prosecutors could take the trial on the road, from city to city to retry basically the same case. Trezevant said the case should be tried here because the investigation began here in the 1990s and involves crimes that happened in this jurisdiction.

"If the defendant doesn't want to be prosecuted in a jurisdiction," Trezevant said, "then don't go to that jurisdiction and commit crimes."

The judge asked about the prohibitive cost of defending the case in Tampa. Gotti likely will call the same witnesses, all of which are from the New York area. His attorney, Charles Canesi, also is from New York.

Trezevant said that witnesses on both sides will be difficult to get to trial, and as for Carnesi, "he's the defendant's choice."

Carnesi said he was confident he could successfully defend Gotti again but argued that the case should be moved to New York.

Getting people to come in to testify is difficult even when they are asked to miss a morning or afternoon of work, he said. When they are asked to hop on a plane and fly to Tampa for several days, he said, that would be impossible.

"It's a tremendous imposition on a witness," the defense attorney said. "This case is about activities in New York."

Prosecutors, Carnesi said, "are trying to isolate him [Gotti] from his witnesses. That's what it's about."

Gotti, dressed in a blue jail outfit, attended the hearing but said nothing.

Reporter Keith Morelli can be reached at (813) 259-7760.

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