Mac attack!
Hit man stalked slain wiseguy on coffee run
He ordered a coffee to go — and then he went, for eternity.
A stealthy hit man gunned down a Luchese family associate at a Bronx fast food drive-thru window while the gangster waited in his idling car for a cup of joe, cops said Friday.
Sylvester Zottola, after surviving at least two previous violent attacks, was shot five times Thursday while behind the wheel outside the McDonald’s, police said.
A worker at a nearby body shop recounted seeing Zottola’s lifeless, blood-spattered body after the gunshots echoed down the street around 4:45 p.m.
“I heard ‘Bang! Bang! Bang!’” said the employee. “I went out, I saw him there (dead). He’s a mobster. He got what he deserved.”
The 71-year-old victim was unarmed and appeared unaware of impending danger as the lone shooter approached his vehicle on Webster Ave. in Claremont.
The gunman slipped through a hole in the fence opposite the restaurant and walked right up to to Zottola, whose car was “boxed in” — with vehicles in front and behind him, police sources said.
Zottola, pronounced dead at the scene, was shot once in the head, three times in the chest and once in the shoulder, cops said. The shooter, carryied a 9-mm. weapon and wore a black hoodie, fled through the same fence hole into a waiting gray Acura sedan to flee south on Clay Ave., sources said.
Multiple shell casings were recovered from the parking lot.
Both Zottola and his son were targeted in recent months, with Sylvester surviving a June run-in with a gunman outside his Pelham Bay home and son Salvatore (Sally Daz) taking two bullets in a failed July rub-out.
The elder Zottola also survived a purported December 2017 robbery attempt inside his home where three waiting “burglars” stabbed him in the neck and back. A neighbor suggesting there were other murder tries on the septuagenarian mob vet.
“It’s unbelievable what they did to him,” said local resident Hector Maldonado, 50. “They tried five times to get him. One was even a home invasion.”
Sylvester Zottola was alone in his car when he was shot. Cops hoped to determine if buying a coffee at the same McDonald’s was part of the victim’s daily routine, making him an easy target.
“He frequents McDonald’s, from what we understand,” said one detective, adding it was unclear if he was a regular at the Webster Ave. outlet. “At this point, we’re just gathering information.”
Mourners outside Zottola’s Bronx home on Friday chased the media away.
“Get the f--- out of here!” shouted one man. “Leave! Leave!”
Maldonado recalled the reputed gangster as a doting grandfather to his two grandkids, a respected businessman and a beloved neighbor.
“He was a very generous guy,” said the retired correction officer. “He’d close down the whole street for block parties, and give away free food.”
A police source said the slain Zottola, once affiliated with long-imprisoned ex-Bonanno family boss Vincent (Vinny Gorgeous) Basciano, was into gambling and loansharking.
“He was a real old-fashioned mobster,” the source said.
The senior Zottola partnered with the owner of the Hello Gorgeous hair salon in running lucrative Joker Poker machines, court documents showed. Basciano is serving a life sentence.