By MICHELE McPHEE and CORKY SIEMASZKO
New York Daily News Staff Writers

An ink drawing of a smiling John Gotti sat on top of his closed coffin, beaming out at mourners and mobsters who filled a Queens funeral home yesterday to pay their respects to the Gambino godfather.

The bronze coffin, engraved with the dates of Gotti's birth and death, was flanked by lavish floral arrangements that filled three rooms in the Maspeth funeral home.

Victoria Gotti, John Gotti's daughter, leaves her father's wake last night.

Gotti's daughter Victoria, clad in a black dress, sat in front of her father's coffin, near a bulletin board bedecked with pictures of the Dapper Don from his heyday as king of the mob.

"This is an important day, a somber day for John Gotti," said his lawyer Bruce Cutler. "I know what the government says, but this was a truly remarkable person."

Cutler told reporters, "If [Gotti] could walk out with me and say hello, he certainly would. He's doing it through me ... Hello."

As cops outside Papavero's Funeral Home took surveillance photos, mourners inside got prayer cards - some featuring a picture of Gotti in a tux, with a white carnation in his lapel.

John Gotti's brother Richard and Richard Jr. arrive at the Maspeth funeral home.

"Do not stand at my grave and weep; I am not there, I do not sleep. Do not stand at my grave and cry, I am not there, I did not die," the card read.

The wake for the Mafia kingpin yesterday played out like a scene from "The Godfather." And as in the classic film, the mobsters didn't like it one bit when intruders tried to crash.

"This is for the family," Gotti's brother Richard told a reporter who managed to get inside, his voice firm but polite.

The Gambino godfather was 61 when he died Monday at a Missouri prison hospital after a long battle with throat cancer. He was in the 10th year of a life sentence for murder and racketeering.

Cops Get Early Start

Long before mourners began arriving for the wake, cops were casing the neighborhood, which Gotti haunted during his time at the helm of New York's most powerful Mafia family.

Victoria Gotti leaves her Howard Beach, Queens, home for her husband's wake.

They set up barricades along Grand Ave. across from the funeral home to keep the crowd of gawkers from getting too close. They jotted down the license plate numbers of arriving cars.

A short time later, they were joined by FBI agents and undercover cops in vans and SUVs with tinted windows.

By midmorning, the street was choked with flower delivery vans. Several arrangements were symbolic of Gotti's favorite vices.

One was in the shape of a racehorse with lucky number seven on the saddle. Another was a royal flush. A third was a horseshoe. And there was a Cuban cigar. All were huge.

"To the chief," read the card on one wreath. Another bore the name of Gotti's old Queens hangout, the Bergin Hunt and Fish Club.

Floral display arrives at Papavero Funeral Home.

As the cops' videotape rolled and cameras snapped, the Gottis started arriving at 1 p.m. Children Victoria, Angela and Peter escorted their mother, also named Victoria, inside.

The Brooklyn Diocese denied Gotti a funeral Mass, but he will be buried tomorrow at St. John's Cemetery in Queens.

Can't Make It

Gotti's son John A. (Junior) Gotti and brother Peter - both behind bars - won't be going to the funeral.

A dapper photo of John Gotti appears on prayer card.

"Young John and Peter, his brother, did not make applications to come here," Cutler said. "Neither would ask the government for anything."

Gotti's other brother, Richard, made the wake with Frank Scollo, a longshoremen's union official. They were arrested last week, along with Peter Gotti, for allegedly plundering the docks and are out on bail.

The Gotti family was followed by a steady stream of burly men in tight-fitting suits and molls in sunglasses. The wiseguys greeted one another with kisses on the cheek but moved their faces from the cameras.

"No respect," huffed a hulking man with slicked-back hair and a pinky ring as he passed a gray Ford Explorer where two G-men were videotaping.

A law enforcement source said authorities spotted more than three dozen made men at the wake, including reputed Gambino consiglieri Joseph Corozzo - a possible Gotti successor.

Also on hand were seven capos from and representatives of all 15 Gambino crime crews.

"This is the only family who does this," the source said, adding that cops shot more than 20 rolls of film. "It's supposed to be a secret society."

With Mike Claffey and Fernanda Santos

Original Publication Date: 6/14/02