e to get the charge reduced to manslaughter. While Gotti was in jail in 1976, Carlo Gambino had a heart attack and was dying. Carlo made a decision that was to create problems for the crime family for almost a decade-he named his brother-in-law Paul Castellano as his successor. Castellano was not respected and admired like Carlo. Perhaps his insecurity caused him to keep Neil as his under boss in charge of all of the more violent activities, such as hijacking. While Paul would focus the family efforts on the more sophisticated criminal activities like union rackets and bid-rigging in construction projects. This decision created two separate branches of the Gambino family: Paul's branch and Neil's branch. The schism did nothing to strengthen the family and ultimately brought about the assassination of Paul in 1985, when after Neil's death, Paul sought to demote Gotti and his men and promote his own favorites. The assassination of Paul Castellano was a brilliant coup on the part of Gotti, not just in the way the ambush was executed, but also in the preparation of the Gambino family and other crime families for the event itself.When John Gotti made his decision that he was going to eliminate Paul, he determined who he would recruit to join him in the conspiracy that was ultimately called the Fist. Gotti had to be very careful, because if in trying to recruit other key members of the Gambino family, word got back to Paul, Gotti himself would be sanctioned and executed. First Sammy was approached, not by Gotti directly, but by Angelo. Sammy realized that Castellano would never survive an all out war with the Bergin crew. Sammy, in spite of his "by the-rules" approach to most things, understood that Paul was not leading the family in the right direction. By Gotti's invitation to Sammy to join up with him, Gotti was signaling that he wanted to unify the family again and heal the schism that had broken the famil...
