It's doubtful Frank Polizzi (at right in a 1998 photo) ever met John Gotti, but Polizzi's case is one reason why the jailed-for-life Gambino boss, whose head and neck cancer flared up recently, will never get out of jail, no matter how severe his prognosis becomes.

First diagnosed with cancer in 1998, the Dapper Don was transferred to a private hospital last week for the third time in five months. He was returned to the prison hospital in Springfield, Mo. early this week, Daily News reporter Mike Claffey wrote yesterday.

Polizzi was convicted of drug dealing in the infamous Pizza Connection trial and sentenced to 20 years . He is best remembered for an ill-fated defense ploy that had jurors ducking for cover and the entire courtroom howling with laughter.

Polizzi's wife was on the witness stand trying to back her husband's claim that the bag the FBI saw him pick up from a cohort in June 1983 contained 

fresh sardines, not money or heroin. Holding a bag she prepared at home that morning as a prop, Cecelia Polizzi testified that her husband had brought the fish home so she could fix a Sicilian specialty dish, pasta al sarde. He left the bag on the counter at midnight and she found it still intact when she awoke the next morning, she said. Suddenly, the bottom fell out of the paper bag and two pounds of wet soggy fish and melting ice hit the floor and brine splattered everywhere. 

Polizzi (at right in 1983 photo with pizza parlor owner/drug dealer Joe Ganci, who died before trial) went to jail in 1987, but seven years ago prison doctors said he had lung cancer and gave him six months to live.

Lawyer Paul Bergman, who represented a codefendant in the legendary 17-month-long trial, cited Polizzi's failing health and petitioned trial judge Pierre Leval to reduce his sentence to time served.  

Leval did, and on April 3, 1995, Polizzi was released from federal prison and returned home to Clifton, N.J. and operated a restaurant, motel complex and a construction company.

A confidante of boss Simone (Sam the Plumber) DeCavalcante before he

went to prison, Polizzi went back to the gangster life he knew best when he got out, heading a crew that engaged in loansharking and gambling, according to court papers.

In 1998 and 1999, he conspired to kill three rival wiseguys, according to an October 2000 racketeering indictment that charged 12 New Jersey gangsters with a slew of crimes, including eight plots to kill other family members, some who were their codefendants.

A few months later, a mob associate whom Polizzi allegedly wanted to kill, Frank (Franky the Beast) Scarabino, joined several DeCavalcante mobsters – real-life Soprano gangsters – who began singing to the FBI after the family was rocked by racketeering and murder charges in December 1999.

Scarabino, sources said, told the feds that a few days before he and Polizzi were indicted on October 19, 2000, Polizzi had instructed him to kill the wife 

and children of Anthony Capo, (left) the first DeCavalcante songbird. Scarabino said he had intended to use two guns the FBI seized from him to do the work.

In April, 2001, federal prosecutors John Hillebrecht, Lisa Korologos and Dani James used Scarabino's information to charge Polizzi with conspiring to kill Capo's family. They also filed murder and other racketeering charges against three additional DeCavalcante soldiers and five associates.

Bergman, who eulogized Polizzi at funeral services at St. Anthony's Church in Belleville, N.J., would not comment about the current case, telling Gang Land he had done no work on it because he knew his client, who was too sick to be brought to court when the FBI arrested him, would never get to trial.

"As I said in his eulogy," he added, "I sat through the entire Pizza trial and I am convinced that he was not guilty of those charges – he was wrongfully convicted."

A defense attorney to the end.

Colombo underboss John (Jackie) DeRoss (right) nearly pulled off a bigger upset at his racketeering trial than the New England Patriots managed against the St. Louis Rams on Super Sunday.

After sweating out four days of jury deliberations, DeRoss, 65, was acquitted yesterday of racketeering, loansharking, money laundering and an extortion conspiracy charge. He was convicted of a lone extortion count  – shaking down a deli owner in a joint scam with Genovese wiseguys – that was added to his original indictment when the feds surfaced Genovese turncoat Michael (Cookie) Durso last April. 

But the deck was stacked against DeRoss. Under the quirky sentencing guidelines that apply, he will likely receive more time for the extortion rap than he would have if he had pleaded guilty to every charge in the indictment.

According to Gang Land's quick and dirty assessment, DeRoss would have faced about 10 years if he had eaten the entire indictment. He now faces about 12 to14 years under guidelines that permit Brooklyn Federal Judge Reena Raggi to consider all the charges for which DeRoss was acquitted by the jury.

At trial, lawyer Paul LeMole conceded that loansharking records found in the home of acting boss Alphonse Persico were written by DeRoss but argued that DeRoss had merely served as a stenographer and that Persico, (right) who had pleaded guilty, was the culprit.

DeRoss, who badmouthed Persico for violating Mafia rules and admitting he was a crime family member when he agreed to a 13-year plea deal, had his bail revoked after the verdict and left to join Persico at the Metropolitan Detention Center to await sentence.

The tough-as-nails gangster, who had loosened his tie to hear the verdict, took it off and left it on the defense table. He gave his coat to a nephew to take home, and was led out of the courtroom with his head held high.