How a former murderer became a New Jersey councilor for a major crime family

Englishtown, NJ – two hours in a town hall meeting in this small town from New Jersey, took a man out of his phone, shaking and filming.

“Do you know that he has promised welfare fraud?” The man asked Mayor Daniel Francisco of the English, referring to the newest councilor of the municipality, John Alite, whose crowd of past has drawn an unusual amount of attention on the quiet town east of Princeton.

“He started with a new life!” A resident shouted back. “We don't want to hear all this!” Another resident stated. “Go! Go! Go!” Residents sang. The support for Alite was palpable.

The man who has built up the accusation of welfare fraud, who admitted to Alite's former boss John Gotti Jr., left the room and left a pack of hand -outs on a chair on the outside. A resident picked up the pile of papers before someone could read them and later handed them to Alite.

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It is certainly not the back and forth that you would expect in a city meeting for a small historic place such as Englishtown, who has a population of around 2,300 people.

Through his own admission, Alite is a former gangster who ran with the Gambino Crime Family, one of the five major families who checked crime in New York City for decades. He argued guilty of racketeering activities in the federal court, including two murders, four conspiracies of murder, at least eight shootings and two attempt at shootings.

He also acknowledged that he was part of armed house invasions and robberies in New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Florida. Alite said in an interview that the house invasions and robberies had been committed against drug dealers.

In New Jersey, the disqualification of serving a public office is limited to crimes involving a person's public office or public employment.

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Drugs, gambling, kidnapping and murder

Alite had a reputation for brutality, according to his book 'John Alite Mafia International' from 2021, which was carried out with Lou Romano. It was that reputation and his connection with John Gotti Jr. Who pulled him into the crowd. Gotti Jr. is the son of John Gotti Sr., who was the boss of the Gambino -crime family from 1985 until his imprisonment in 1992.

An article in New York Times from 1989 posted Alite, then 26, with Gotti Jr., then 25, in a restaurant in Long Island where they came in a fight.

Alite would later move to New Jersey and then Florida, where he was involved in drug trafficking and extortion. While the researchers got close, Alite fled to Brazil at the beginning of 2004, according to an article in St. Petersburg Times at that time.

Alite was accused of “controlling illegal companies, illegal gambling, extortion, drug trafficking, money laundering, kidnapping and murder as a top lieutenant in Gambino family in New York,” the article said.

After having spent 10 months in Brazil, the FBI Alite traced in an internet café. Alite would fight for more than two years of extradition in a prison in Brazil before he was transferred to the FBI at the end of 2006.

At the beginning of 2008, Alite argued guilty of a racketeer -influenced and corrupt organizations act conspiracy and admitted to the two murders and shootings, local news shops reported at the time.

He started working together with officers, also in a case against Gotti Jr., who had succeeded his namesake of the Gambino -crime -deed family.

In 2011, Alite was sentenced to 10 years in prison. Some of the 10 years were considered to be spent time in prisons in the US and Brazil and according to the Tampa Bay Times he received an extra reduction of 20 months in his sentence. He was released in 2012.

The case of Gotti Jr. Finished in a mistrial, in which some jury members stated that they did not believe Alite, who was the most important witness.

Life after the crowd

Since Alite's release in 2012, he has named himself a reformed man, in which he has done interviews with news stations about his former life and recording epodcasts.

Alite said he moved to Englishtown after his daughter Chelsea died of the use of Fentanyl in 2022. His family had had a house in the English city, but had rented it. Alite said after the death of his daughter, he decided to move to the sleepy city to forge a new life.

In March, Alite was appointed to the city council to fill a vacancy with the support of Francisco, the mayor of Englishtown and other local leaders.

Francisco said he and Alite have known each other for a few years. “Our understanding of each other is hanging around with these local companies, hanging out with our business owners and talking about the problems that our city is confronted with, usually around the prospect of trying to get development going,” said Francisco.

Alite described Francisco as a non -judgmental person who does not care about his criminal record from the past. The two do not discuss the past much, but Francisco has shown interest in the role of Alite as a speaker and shares warning stories from his days in the Gambino -crime and family.

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“I have a great interest in drug problems, whether it is this city or throughout the country,” said Alite. “(I) had a great interest in that, after he was destroyed like hundreds of thousands of families.”

Alite's conversations also discuss the dangers of drug use, but are mainly in the middle of his life of crime and how he managed to reverse his life. “I don't run away (my past). I am not proud of it. I am ashamed of it,” he said.

Alite will not be election until 2027.

Contributions: Christopher Cann

This article originally appeared on Asbury Park Press: this councilor of New Jersey was once a murderer for Gambino Crime Family