Over the course of a 25-year career in organized crime, mobster-turned-government-witness John Alite had a front-row seat to the rise and fall of the John Gotti family or as he describes them, “a dysfunctional group of Mafia misfits.” Alite was no angel either, however. As a Mob enforcer for the Gotti family, he claims he often committed violent acts including murder. He ran million-dollar rackets that laundered money from New York and New Jersey to Florida. But even Alite was disgusted by the Gotti family and especially John Gotti’s son, Gotti Junior. “With Junior, it was always about money,” Alite said. “Friendship didn’t matter. You could have been his friend for a dozen years and he’d still rip you off. That’s just the way he was. Him and his father, both the same.” The Gottis were certainly not the Corleones of Godfather fame, Alite said. Instead of any tradition of honor, the Gotti family was ruled by nepotism, greed and treachery, resulting in the destruction of what had once been one of the largest criminal outfits in history. Alite worked with the family during the 1980s-90s at a time when John Gotti was regularly featured in New York tabloids and was known as “Teflon Don” for beating multiple raps. Alite and Junior Gotti were friends and business partners, making and splitting millions of dollars through fast deals. But everything eventually soured. Alite, facing indictment, fled the country in 2003, living an extravagant lifestyle for one short year before being captured in Brazil in 2004. In 2007 he turned government witness and testified in several trials including a high profile 2009 trial against Junior Gotti that ended in a mistrial. Released from prison in 2012, Alite turned down participation in the Witness Protection Program, returning to New Jersey and what he hopes will be a “normal life.” His story is told in the 2015 book Gotti’s Rules: The Story of John Alite, Junior Gotti, and the Demise of the American Mafia by George Anastasia.