NEW YORK (1010 WINS) -- Jury selection began Tuesday in the racketeering trial of a 74-year-old reputed Mafiosi who prosecutors say cozied up to an undercover FBI agent who infiltrated the Gambino crime family.
Lawyers for Gregory DePalma said their ailing client had a rough first day in court after U.S. District Judge Alvin K.
Hellerstein decided last week he could not sit in a wheelchair or rest in a gurney during the trial.
``He was in pain,'' lawyer Martin Geduldig said. ``He was falling asleep.''
Geduldig said DePalma is missing a lung and suffers from an assortment of serious illnesses, including diabetes and heart disease.
The white-haired DePalma sat in a courtroom chair at a defense table as potential jurors were questioned so the judge and lawyers could decide whether they would be fair jurors. The judge let him put his feet on a stool.
Geduldig said DePalma's day was made worse when medical professionals refused to let him take prescribed medications to court, leaving him without relief from considerable pain.
DePalma also did not have breakfast or the snacks he needs to regulate his blood-sugar content, the lawyer said.
Geduldig said he expects the government at trial to introduce evidence, including taped conversations by DePalma, to try to ``portray him as a phony.''
Another defense lawyer, John Meringolo, said DePalma's heart troubles are so bad that water collects throughout his body, causing him to become bloated and his skin to crack. On Tuesday, he said, DePalma's legs were bleeding because of the issue. Geduldig said: ``His life expectancy is not very long.''
The lawyer said there was nothing phony about his client's illnesses and rejected any comparison to the late Vincent ``The Chin'' Gigante, the powerful mob boss who avoided jail for decades by wandering the Greenwich Village streets in a ratty bathrobe and slippers as part of an elaborate feigned mental illness.
``He doesn't walk around the streets in a bathrobe,'' Geduldig said.
DePalma, who once posed backstage with Frank Sinatra, is accused of playing a key role in the Gambino family. A major component of the evidence against him will be the testimony of an undercover FBI agent who infiltrated the family for two years, the government has said.
The judge has ruled that his testimony will occur in a closed courtroom but that an audio feed will be made available. In asking for a closed courtroom, the government cited published reports that the mob has put a $250,000 contract on the agent's life.
Prosecutors said the prospects for a plot ``continue to exist,'' in part because 12 of 13 defendants charged with racketeering in the indictment have pleaded guilty and face long prison sentences.
The agent is working on other undercover roles in probes in several states that sometimes require meeting subjects in places near New York, the government said.
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