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John Gotti Jr. Jury Says Deadlocked Again

By Jeralyn, Section Crime in the News
Posted on Tue Nov 24, 2009 at 06:37:33 PM EST
Tags: John Gotti, Jr. (all tags)
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The Government ought to give John Gotti, Jr. a rest. After 9 days of deliberations in a 4th retrial, the jury announced it was deadlocked. But the Judge gave them the dynamite charge, rather than let them go.

The end seemed near for the fourth racketeering trial of Gotti when the jury said it could not reach a unanimous verdict in a note late in its ninth day of deliberations, a record for the Gotti trials. Gotti, 45, blew a kiss to his family before taking his seat.

After rejecting a defense request to declare a mistrial, U.S. District Judge Kevin P. Castel summoned the jury and delivered a so-called Allen charge, instructing jurors to try hard once more to come to a consensus.

[More...]

"This trial has been conducted at considerable expense and human effort to both the government and the defendant," the judge told them. "If your deliberations do not end in a verdict, in all likelihood it would have to be tried again before another jury."

Enough already. At least one on the jury believes he had withdrawn from the mob when the murders were committed.

Gotti's attorney Charles Carnesi said his client quit the Mafia in 1999 and never participated in murders. When he requested a mistrial Tuesday, Carnesi said it would be coercive to force the jury to continue deliberations.

Background on the case is here. (And yes, that's really my tee-shirt that I got at the Feast of San Gennaro festival in New York around 1995....but it refers to his father.)

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