Capo John (Jackie Nose) D'Amico will soon be hit with federal racketeering charges and added to the case pending against Gotti's son and the acting boss of the Gambinos - John A. (Junior) Gotti.

D'Amico would be the 18th Gotti capo charged with state or federal crimes since the Dapper Don turned in his tailor-made suits for prison garb after he was convicted on federal murder and racketeering charges and sentenced to life on June 23, 1992.

D'Amico (left) has reputedly served on a three-capo committee that helped Junior Gotti carry out his father's wishes from prison. He is expected to be charged specifically with bookmaking and loansharking.

The capo's problems are an open secret. His lawyer, James DiPietro, told Gang Land that his client is lodged at a motel near the federal courthouse in White Plains to get a jump on things.

"We're not running away from this," he said. "We'll answer the charges in court when they're filed."

Nailing D'Amico has been a priority for the feds since Gotti anointed him as his man-Friday. He began bouncing with the once-Teflon Don shortly after Gotti beat a federal racketeering charge in 1987. D'Amico was seen constantly with Gotti. He would accompany him to the Ravenite Social Club, to Upper East Side restaurants, night clubs and boxing matches at the Felt Forum.

He was a daily spectator at Gotti's 1992 trial and a spin doctor who blasted his boss's enemies,  notably federal prosecutors and turncoat underboss Salvatore (Sammy Bull) Gravano, and lavished praise on Gotti, which bordered on unabashed hero worship.

"A (man like) John only comes along once in a life. They broke the mold with John. He's  original," D'Amico said during one break. "John had two things going for him, he was loved and feared.  He's the only person I've seen with both. You call it charisma. He has that. But love and fear was what counted. People don't cross a man they love and fear."

Gravano, once Gotti's trusted right-hand-man-in-crime, "makes Charles Mansion look like an altar boy," said D'Amico, warning reporters that the feds would try to make Gravano out to be a saint when he testified. "They're gonna try and make him look like a priest. By the time he gets on the stand, they'll have made him into a monk."

Last month, the Little Italy building that housed the infamous Ravenite Social Club, where D'Amico spent many a night, and where Gotti got caught with his foot in his mouth, was sold for a cool $1 million.

The five story building, which has 18  apartments,  went for more than twice its initial $475,000 appraisal in a newly chic area of Manhattan that realtors have dubbed Nolita - North of Little Italy. "The area's really hot," said Wilbur Gonzalez of Douglas Elliman Real Estate, which brokered the deal.

The new owners -- they laid out $1,030,000 in cash -- declined to discuss their plans for the building. But sources say there are plans to renovate the first floor. which includes the former two-room clubhouse an apartment, into a restaurant-bar.

Tenants in the building told my Daily News colleague Helen Peterson that they knew little about the deal, the new landlords, or their plans.

"I hope the new guys who take over the building do well. More power to them -- just as long as they don't kick me out. I'm a good tenant," said Christopher Todd.

Longtime tenant Madeleine Smyth summed it all up: " I think the past is the past and it is going to totally change. I think that social club is dead."

The Manhattan real estate market may be booming, but that's not helping Nicholas (Little Nick) Corozzo (left) and Leonard DiMaria, two of the 18 Gotti capos to bite the dust.

Seems the two Brooklyn based mobsters have their money tied up in hard-to-sell real estate in the Ocean-Hill Brownsville section of Brooklyn, Middletown, NY, and Mastic, Long Island, according to their lawyers.

Their reputed real estate hassles has Brooklyn federal prosecutors upset and complaining that the wiseguys are trying to renege on a deal to pay a $500,000 fine before they are sentenced for racketeering later this month.

Corozzo, who owns a Brooklyn building appraised at $275,000, had a deal to sell it for $215,000, but it fell through, lawyers Gerald Shargel and Joseph Corozzo told Brooklyn Federal Judge Frederic Block last month.

DiMaria is trying to sell property next to an industrial area in Mastic, L.I. — but it isn't worth as much as he figured.

"He thought he was buying in the Hamptons. He's a Brooklyn boy," said his lawyer Susan Kellman, who added that there have been no takers for DiMaria's Middletown property either.

Corozzo and DiMaria (right) pleaded guilty to racketeering last year in a deal that calls for 10-year prison terms. They and mobster Louis (Brother) Scida, who also pleaded guilty to racketeering, agreed to fork over $500,000 before official sentencing -- with another $1 million to follow.

After much back and forth between the lawyers and assistant U.S. attorney David Hennessey, Block told the prosecutors and the defense lawyers to work out an agreement and get back to him. The oft-adjourned case is now set for June 11.

ASK ANDY
This week, Andy takes a look at some of the mob connections that have dogged Frank Sinatra for half a century - decades before he posed with Carlo Gambino and a bunch of other wiseguys in 1976 for the famous backstage photo that was the subject of Gang Land's first contest.

Perhaps the best place to start is Francis Ford Coppolla's Mafia film classic, "The Godfather." In the wedding scene at the beginning of the movie, Michael Corleone explains to his lover why star singer Johnny Fontaine would appear at the celebration. He tells a thinly-disguised version of the oft-repeated story about the feud between Sinatra and band leader Tommy Dorsey. According to legend, Sinatra wanted to be released from his long-term contract as lead singer for Dorsey's band, and he got it by getting a Mafia goon to stick a gun in Dorsey's mouth.

The truth is much more mundane. Dorsey reluctantly granted Sinatra's release in return for a  percentage of Sinatra's future earnings. Sinatra was initially happy with this arrangement but later began to resent it when he became more successful. A public feud erupted between these two men of giant egos. Eventually, a final settlement was worked out with Dorsey taking a $60,000 buyout. People in both Sinatra's and Dorsey's camps have confirmed many times that there was no extortion, no gun, and no threats. Over the years, however, the legend grew.

Dorsey, probably resenting the rising stardom of his former employee, once said publicly that three hoods had forced him into signing. This was after it became apparent that Dorsey realized he had made a horrible financial miscalculation. His extortion story was an attempt to save face. Sinatra greatly resented this implication of mob involvement and had little to do with Dorsey after that, perpetuating the rumor into legend. The great success of "The Godfather" movie essentially turned rumor to fact.

One of the most memorable scenes in The Godfather was the film producer awaking to find a severed head of his prize horse in his bed. He then caved in, having been made an offer he couldn't refuse, and gave Johnny Fontaine a leading role in a movie. This has become accepted as the real story behind Sinatra winning the role of Maggio, in the movie, "Here To Eternity." He won an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor and his lagging career was revived. In reality, he won the role through a combination of luck and persistent lobbying. The producer wanted Eli Wallach to play Maggio. His

screen test was by far the best of the actors competing for the part, including Sinatra. But Wallach was committed to a Broadway play and supposedly  demanded an exorbitant salary which infuriated Harry Cohn, the producer. Once this became known, Cohn came under even more pressure to use Sinatra. At the time, Sinatra was married to Ava Gardner, who at the time was one of Hollywood's superstars. She had some influence with Cohn's wife and relentlessly plugged her husband. Sinatra's agents were hard at work as well. Finally with time pressures, Cohn asked his wife's opinion. After watching the screen test she said she felt Sinatra looked like the Maggio of the James Jones book. So Cohn finally picked on Sinatra, his decision no doubt helped because the singer would take the part for $8000. He was paid more than $100,000 for his previous movie. While it was a complicated process with many twists and turns, there were no threats and certainly there was no horse's head. Besides, Cohn didn't even own one.

Although these two stories were unfair to Sinatra there is no doubt that Sinatra himself played a huge role helping people believe that they were true. For decades, Sinatra was on friendly terms with numerous Cosa Nostra figures.

In 1947, he made his infamous trip to Cuba to greet Lucky Luciano (right) who had moved there illegally from his exile in Italy. Sinatra was photographed disembarking a plane with a well known Chicago mobster. Sinatra was carrying a briefcase, which led to speculation that he was acting as a money courier for Luciano.

A second notorious association occurred in 1960. The FBI overheard Sam Giancanna, boss of the Chicago Outfit, expressing disgust with Sinatra's failure to get the Kennedy Family to end an FBI investigation of him. According to Giancanna, he was promised this favor in return for getting mob controlled areas of Chicago to support John Kennedy during the 1960 Presidential election. The problem with this story is that we only have Giancanna saying Sinatra made the promise.

These same bugs revealed that Kennedy was bedding a woman with close links to Giancanna, Sinatra and another Chicago mobster. It was shortly after this that the Kennedys cut their ties with Sinatra who had become a  potential public relations disaster. None of this would be revealed until years after JFK's death.

In 1963,  the McGuire Sisters were headlining at Sinatra's Cal-Nev Lodge in Nevada. Giancanna, who was dating Phyllis McGuire at the time, was  excluded from all casinos in Nevada. Through secret FBI bugs in Chicago, the Nevada Gaming Commission became aware that Giancanna was at the Lodge, and that Sinatra knew it. The resulting investigation drove Sinatra wild. He went on one of his trademark tirades and eventually gave up his interest in Cal-Nev.

More than a decade later, Sinatra was involved in the episode which provided the picture for our first contest. A variety of mobsters had become involved in the operation of a Las Vegas Style theater in Tarrytown in Westchester County. A tremendous amount of cash was being skimmed and the theater needed a huge drawing card, like Sinatra. He appeared there in September 1976. It was a major event that naturally attracted a host of major mobsters, especially since it was their joint. In attendance at one performance was Mafia boss Carlo Gambino, Paul Castellano, soon to be Gambino's successor, and Aladena (Jimmy The Weasel) Fratianno. They and a number of other hoods went backstage and had their picture taken with the crooner that we ran two months ago. Sinatra knew very well who Gambino was, but was really in no position to refuse to pose even if he was inclined to do so. When the picture was published during the trial of some gangsters years later, it revived all the Sinatra mob stories, rumors and legends. Fratianno tried to implicate Sinatra in a number of the scams but there was no evidence to support his testimony.

It is hardly surprising that Sinatra appeared in clubs owned or controlled by mobsters. They had been in this lucrative cash business since Prohibition. In addition, Las Vegas was once a wide open mob town, and there were always plenty of gangsters around whenever Sinatra performed. Tickets were difficult to come by and having "connections" was always helpful. Furthermore, what better way to impress your wife or girlfriend than front row seats at a Sinatra show. And it was not uncommon for some hoods to join the crowd of well wishers and backslappers back stage. In fact, many mobsters were Sinatra groupies and tried to gain prestige from personal contact with the star entertainer. There really was nothing to gain for Sinatra to snub these characters. In those days, there wasn't the daily incessant coverage of celebrity news by television and the tabloids. So who greeted Sinatra and shook his hand was not widely known.

Furthermore, why anger mobsters who kill people who cross or displease them. More than likely, Sinatra loved the aura of danger provided by his mob associations. It served notice to minor league hoods not to try to muscle in on him.

The FBI collected numerous files on all these associations and a careful analysis of them makes it obvious that while Sinatra associated with undesirables, there is no hard evidence than it was anything more than that. This was the conclusion drawn by former FBI supervising agent, Jules Bonavolonta, after he was assigned to examine the extensive files.

Sinatra was a controversial superstar who was arrogant and aggressive. He chose to associate with mobsters -- he always did it "My Way" -- but to say he was mob connected or in bed with the mob is pushing the envelope a little too far.