Sammy Gravano
American mobster
Salvatore "Sammy the Bull" Gravano (born March 12, 1945) is an American former mobster who rose to the position of underboss in the Gambino crime family of New York City before becoming a government witness. As the underboss, Gravano played a major role in prosecuting John Gotti, the crime family's boss, by agreeing to testify as a government witness against him and other mobsters in a deal. As part of the agreement, Gravano confessed to his involvement in at least 19 murders, although he was also responsible for a number of other crimes.
Originally an associate for the Colombo crime family, and later for the Brooklyn faction of the Gambino family, Gravano was part of the group in 1985 that conspired to murder Gambino boss Paul Castellano. Gravano played a key role in planning and executing Castellano's murder, along with John Gotti, Angelo Ruggiero, Frank DeCicco, and Joseph Armone.
Soon after Castellano's murder, Gotti elevated Gravano to become an official captain after Salvatore "Toddo" Aurelio stepped down, a position Gravano held until 1987 when he became consigliere. In 1988, he became underboss, a position he held at the time he became a government witness. In 1991, Gravano agreed to turn state's evidence and testify for the prosecution against Gotti after hearing the boss making several disparaging and untrue remarks about Gravano on a wiretap that implicated them both in several murders.
At the time, Gravano was among the highest-ranking members of the Five Families to break his blood oath and to cooperate with the government. As a result of his testimonies, Gotti and Frank LoCascio were sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole in 1992.
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This entry incorporates text from “Sammy Gravano” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.