Richard Stratton

Mr. Stratton’s article, Godfather and Son published in Playboy, won the 2011 New York Press Club Award for Crime Reporting. He is the executive producer and director of a four-hour documentary series for A&E based on his magazine article about John Gotti Senior and John Gotti Junior.

This documentary will air tomorrow and Sunday,  June 9 and June 10.

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I was born in Boston and grew up in Wellesley, Massachusetts.  Wellesley was a bastion of WASPdom when I came of age there. My family, on both sides, were New England Yankee blue bloods. My maternal grandmother was a Lowell.

I was a troubled kid; formed perhaps the first and only kid’s gang Wellesley had ever known, called the Pink Rats after a gang of juvenile delinquents I saw in an episode of Dragnet. Too much TV as a kid, grew up admiring Al Capone instead of Elliot Ness while watching The Untouchables. Seemed inevitable I would end up in reform school and later the penitentiary.

Click to view a 2 minute trailer from Richard Stratton’s Godfather and Son

That’s a long story. I met the father, John Gotti Senior while we were both locked up in the Manhattan Correctional Center, MCC, the federal holding facility in Foley Square, also known as The Criminal Hilton.

I write a whole chapter about my time there in my latest book, KINGPIN: Prisoner of the War on Drugs. I was awaiting trial on charges of importing marijuana and hashish – now legal in over 20 states; just a little ahead of my time.

John Senior was locked up for a few days before making bail, and I was introduced to him. Later, in 2011, I was assigned by Playboy magazine to cover John Gotti Junior’s fourth federal trial. I became friendly with the Gotti family during the weeks of Junior’s trial and then met and interviewed John when he was freed after yet another mistrial due to hung juries.

His is a fascinating case that we get into in the docu-series. Junior’s decision to quit the Mafia is what made it interesting to me – not an easy thing to do when your father is that guy, The Godfather. The article I published in Playboy won the 2011 New York Press Club award for crime reporting. The award was presented to me in a ceremony at the Water Club by our neighbor, Ray Kelly.

Smuggler’s Blues and Kingpin are the first two volumes of a trilogy telling the story of my life in the so-called hippie mafia, and then my experience as a federal prisoner from 1982 to 1990. Volume Three, In The World: From the Big House to Hollywood is coming out in 2019.

We have lived in Battery Park City for at least nine years. Just good fortune brought us here. We looked at an apartment, loved the area, the neighborhood, and moved in. Before moving here, we lived in Chelsea.

I was once asked what is the first thing you’d want to do when you got out of prison. I said, grab a copy of the New York Times and a cappuccino.

Certainly they are still part of my ritual. But also I work out whenever I can, love to take long walks through the city. Read pretty much constantly when not actually at my desk writing. I am also intrigued by goings-on in our state and federal criminal and civil courts and follow major cases… always looking for new stories.

We are big fans of Merchant’s River House, get treated like royalty whenever we go there by the manager, Charles, and are also close to Abraham Merchant. Del Monico’s is another favorite. And I love Hudson Eats, all the great restaurants in Brookfield.

Integrity. Do what you say and believe. Faith in God. Discipline. Kindness. Humility. Bravery. Find something you love doing and then figure out how to earn a living doing it. At one point, I loved smuggling pot. Unfortunately, it was illegal. But what I always wanted to do was to be a writer. I used to tell people I smuggled pot to support my writing habit.

What are the next projects you’re working on?

I am gearing up to do a documentary series on the history of cannabis in America. This mysterious plant has had an amazing history during my lifetime, from “the weed with roots in hell” as it was called during the Reefer Madness era, to a medicinal and recreational herb now legal in over 20 states, soon to be legal nationally in Canada — July, I believe — and the USA can’t be far behind.

The folks I worked with, the so-called hippie mafia, by the DEA, changed the culture of this country, and that interests me, how as Americans we are able to influence our government and change the laws and the direction of the government when they are wrong, i.e. civil rights, war in Vietnam, and cannabis.

To be involved in the shaping of government attitudes, that is the essence of what it means to be an American. The politicians are not always right. The concept of my country right or wrong, in my mind, is not what we as Americans are about. I believe one must always challenge authority.

How did you meet your lovely wife? And what are your five kids up to?

Luckiest day of my life: I met my wife while working for a legendary TV producer and former New York City detective, Sonny Grosso. Sonny hired me to write a screenplay about Boston gangster Whitey Bulger. I walked into Sonny’s office one day to get paid, and saw Antoinette sitting there. She was managing actors and musicians at the time. One look at her and  I thought, “Hmmm, this meeting just got a lot more interesting.” Thanks, Sonny. I owe you one…

The kids are all doing great. My oldest son, Maxwell, is a builder with his own construction company. Dash, my middle son, is a chef at a restaurant owned by his wife’s family. I tell the boys they have got it covered: shelter, building homes, and food. The basics. My younger daughter, Sasha, is in college at SUNY New Paltz and working in internet marketing. Bianca, our oldest, works at One Hotel and lives with us. Our youngest boy, Ivan, is in the sixth grade (Science Fair tonight, Dad!) and is a dedicated and talented soccer player on the DUSC Academy team. They are all great kids, thank God.