It's not everyday that a plumbing supply salesman gets convicted and sentenced to life in prison. After all, out of all the possible occupations one would normally associate with winding up in prison for life - drug kingpin, paid assassin, mass murderer, international spy, e.t.c. - plumbing supply salesman has to got be pretty low on the list, if at all. But as it is with life in general, there are always exceptions. And on June 23rd, 1992, the world's most famous plumbing supply salesman was sentenced to five consecutive life terms in prison without parole.
No longer would plumbing and the words “low risk” ever be synonymous!
When John Gotti was led from the courtroom after his sentencing, a few weeks after the end of a lengthy trial which included John Gurino, a lifelong Gotti friend and plumbing supply company owner, describing John Gotti as a plumbing supply salesman for his company, so marked the end of the line for Gotti and his plumbing career. He would have to trade in his salesman attire - $3,000 dollar double-breasted Brioni suits, diamond pinkie ring, and his hand-painted silk ties in favor of a rather bland and unstylish orange prison jumpsuit. The perils of the salesman's life had come home to roost!
But Gotti, obviously, was an ultra-successful and top-flight salesman during his heyday. Spending his days and nights at various New York City social clubs and discos, eating gourmet foods from some of the finest Big Apple restaurants, and being chauffeured about town in his shiny black Mercedes Benz with the headlight wipers, Gotti seemed a master at time management: For all his hours spent cavorting and partying and being a man about town, Gotti still found the time to peddle his plumbing wares!
But then the federal government stepped in and, to put it mildly, complicated Gotti's ability to earn a living and feed his family by accusing him of some rather un-gentlemanly behavior. It seemed that Gotti, in a few moments of leisure and bravado outside his normal workday duties of extolling the benefits of the Gurino line of plumbing supplies to area businesses, was recorded on several wiretaps and bugs discussing some very un-plumbing-like business: multiple murders, shakedowns, union corruption, e.t.c. Obviously, it takes a bit more than just your basic knowledge of pipes and fittings to be a plumbing supply salesman of John Gotti's caliber!
The government even went so far as to accuse Gotti of being the boss or “Godfather” of an entity called the Gambino crime family, which specializes in all things criminal and nefarious. And after a lengthy trial, which included those damaging wiretaps and bugs of Gotti, along with the damning testimony of a Gotti friend, Sammy Gravano, the government was able to convince a jury of Gotti's guilt. John Gotti was history!
And the plumbing profession lost its star salesman!
