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For months, Sylvester Zottola has been pursued by someone who wanted him dead. On Thursday evening, a night fell outside the Bronx McDonald's, it appears that someone caught up with him.
Mr. Zottola, a reputed associate of New York's Bonanno crime family, was believed to have been waiting in his U.V. to pick up his order at the drive-through window when he was shot dead.
In the face of a murder-style murder, Mr. Zottola was shot once in his head. He was pronounced dead at the scene. His assassin fled in what the police say was a gray vehicle, and remains at large.
It is the bloody conclusion to months' worth of gangland-style assaults against both Mr. Zottola, 71, and his son, Salvatore, who through the 1990s and early 2000s supplied Joker Poker machines to mob-controlled gambling hubs, according to short documents.
Less than 3 months ago, the younger Mr. Zottola, 41, narrowly escaped his own brush with death. Ambushed by a Gunman on a Quiet Neighborhood in the Early Hours of July 11, Mr. Zottola was left for his family's Throgs Neck compound. He was shot multiple times by an unidentified assailant, but he survived.
Caught on a grainy security camera footage, the sloppy hit man sped off in a getaway car.
That, too, was not the first overture against the family this summer. The Elder Mr. Zottola was facing charges in the Bronx Criminal Court for an unlicensed gun at an unknown thug. The would-be assailant vanished, and Mr. Zottola was charged with criminal possession of a firearm. He was scheduled to appear in short next Tuesday.
There have been no arrests beyond the elder Mr. Zottola in connection with either incident, though investigators said that they were connected to each other, and that the two of them could have been in their cross-hairs.
The investigation into the incidents was passed by the Bronx district attorney's office to federal investigators earlier this year. Asked about the investigation Thursday night, the United States Attorney's Office declined to comment.
Call to Salvatore Zottola's phone number was unanswered.
According to short papers, the elder Mr. Zottola, who was known as Sally Daz, brought his son into the fold in the late 1990s. Mr. Zottola was a noted associate of Vincent J. Basciano, who led the Bonanno crime family in the early 2000s. Mr. Zottola opened his family's Throgs Neck Compound to Mr. Basciano's girlfriend, Debra Kalb, who lived at home around the turn of the century.
As Mr. Zottola aged, so did the vitality of his mobland ties. Mr. Basciano, who was known as Vinny Gorgeous, led the Bonanno family only briefly, before landing a life sentence in federal prison over murder and racketeering charges. Mr. Zottola's namesake company, D.A.Z. Amusements, which served the mob 's poker machines, appeared to have gone beyond the limits of the rule of law, and the new organized crime apparatuses – namely the Armenian and Russian mobs – have moved into the more traditional consigliere turf.
In the parking lot of McDonald's on Thursday evening, bullet holes were visible in the passenger-side window of a maroon S.U.V.
Juan Bravo, who owns an auto body shop nearby, said McDonald's when he heard gunshots.
"Two minutes later it was concussion with ambulances," he said.
Mr. Bravo said he believed that a woman and a baby were in the car, but that they appeared to be unharmed. He said that video footage from his shop and from the paint store had been shared with the police.
Alexandra Cuatlayo, a high school senior who had planned to stop at the McDonald's on Claremont Village, said violence was common in the neighborhood.
"For this area it's pretty usual," she said. "This area is really active. Around where I live, someone was shot there, too. So this area is really iffy. "
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