A federal judge hammered a Gambino gunman with a stunning 20-year sentence for racketeering yesterday – holding the wiseguy responsible for the near-fatal kidnapping and shooting of radio host Curtis Sliwa.
Manhattan federal Judge Shira Scheindlin said the evidence at trial proved Michael Yannotti held Sliwa in the back of a stolen taxi in June 1992 and “escalated the situation” by shooting him with the intent to kill.
“How Mr. Sliwa survived this at all is nothing short of a miracle,” Scheindlin said.
Sliwa’s eyes welled with tears as the judge said he had saved himself by acting “with superhuman strength and ingenuity to escape that death car.”
Prosecutors claim that mob scion John “Junior” Gotti orchestrated the botched attack on Sliwa in retaliation for his on-air rants against Gotti’s now-dead dad, “Dapper Don” John Gotti, but that Junior wanted the radio host beaten, not killed.
The sentencing was the closest thing to justice for Sliwa, who waited 12 years before charges were brought in the case and who testified at three trials that ended with hung juries.
At the third trial, the jury held Junior Gotti responsible for the kidnapping, but that wasn’t enough for a conviction under racketeering laws, which require prosecutors to prove two criminal acts.
Scheindlin’s decision on Yannotti in effect overruled a jury in the first trial, in which he was a co-defendant. The jurors were hung on a kidnapping charge and acquitted Yannotti of attempted murder – but did convict him of one count of racketeering.
Yannotti was not tried in the two subsequent cases.
Sliwa told the judge he continues to suffer pain.
“It’s not over. It’s a nightmare for me mentally and physically,” Sliwa said. “It helped destroy my marriage. It cost me my job.”