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After a month of intense surveillance, the police moved in on Feb. 24. They arrested Sammy, Debra, his daughter Karen, her fiance David Seabrook, Gerard as well as Papa and 41 others. In raids on their properties, police found ecstasy pills, guns and nearly $100,000 in cash, most of it in the Gravano house. (In Sammy's separate apartment, the only drugs found were pot and Viagra.) Gravano, who has pleaded not guilty, is still in jail, unable to come up with $5 million bail. There is some skepticism about the extent of Gravano's role among federal officials who know him. They say there is a big difference between mentoring kids and masterminding a drug operation. "This is going to be a wiretap case," says a defense lawyer. "If the wiretaps hold up, the government has a good case. If they don't, it falls apart."
Still, a DEA source theorizes, even as a mentor, Gravano "seems to have forgotten all he learned. He just did everything wrong. He used his own house for meetings and to store drugs. He used his own telephone without even trying to use code words. He drove a flashy Lexus that made him stand out. He left records of the transactions around. He used his wife to monitor the money and kids to run the operation. He prided himself on being a mobster. But he sure forgot what John Gotti taught him."