The house on 86th Street in Queens where John Favara lived.
The story of the termination of John Favara, the backyard neighbor of Gambino crime family Godfather John Gotti , who is rumored to be rubbed-out by Gotti hitman Charles Carneglia–begins and ends with a blind spot.
by BY David J. Krajicek ,daily news
Favara was a decent, working man from Howard Beach, Queens. He labored at the Castro Convertibles factory in New Hyde Park, L.I.
He and his wife, Janet, were loving parents of two adopted kids. They raised them on 86th St. in Howard Beach, a middle-class neighborhood roped off from the rest of Queens by the Belt Parkway.
Favara’s back-fence neighbors were John and Victoria Gotti, parents of five children. His son, Scott, was a sleep-over buddy with the oldest of the three Gotti boys, Junior.
On March 18, 1980, Favara finished his shift at Castro and drove the 13 miles home. He turned off Cross Bay Blvd. onto 157th Ave. – and into the glare of the setting sun.
Ten minutes earlier, Frank Gotti, 12, had jumped on the minibike of a neighbor kid named Kevin McMahon. He buzzed up and down the streets and sidewalks, an elated boy astride an engine.
Six blocks from home, young Gotti motored through a home renovation job site on 157th Ave., where a construction dumpster was parked at the curb.
The boy drove the minibike into the street, just beyond the dumpster and into the sun-glare blind spot of Favara.
It was a tragic fatal accident.
In 1980, John Gotti was still five years away from front-page infamy. But Favara was well aware of Gotti’s rising-star mob status.
By all reasonable accounts, he was horrified at having played a role in a child’s death – whether he was a Gotti or not.
But the Gottis lived by their own rules, and authorities say that John Gotti’s wife, Victoria, demanded an eye for an eye.
Two days after the accident, a woman called the local police precinct to announce that Favara would be “eliminated.” Favara thought it was absurd when cops warned him. Those things only happen in movies, he said.
But he began getting anonymous threats by phone and mail. Victoria Gotti glowered across the back fence, incensed that Favara continued to drive the car that had killed her son.
A photo of Frank Gotti and a Mass card from his funeral were planted in Favara’s mailbox. On May 22, someone spray-painted “MURDERER” on his car.
Favara sought advice from a boyhood friend whose father Ettore Zappi was a mob captain. He urged Favara to get rid of his car and leave Howard Beach – urgently.
Victoria Gotti delivered an exclamation point on May 28 when she clubbed him with a baseball bat in his driveway.
He put his house up for sale, and a buyer quickly materialized. The legal paperwork was expedited, and a closing was scheduled for the last day of July
Hollywood goodfella 