DOJ sought advice from a notorious Mafia henchman on ‘86 47’ case against ex-FBI chief James Comey

Salvatore ‘Sammy the Bull’ Gravano’s claims are disputed by a former mob prosecutor and judge who called them ‘preposterous’

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The Justice Department turned to the notorious former mobster Salvatore “Sammy the Bull” Gravano to buttress charges against former FBI Director James Comey for allegedly threatening the life of President Donald Trump, Comey’s lawyers revealed in a new court filing.

Legal papers filed late Tuesday show that an FBI agent interviewed the Gambino crime family underboss-turned-informant about the Mafia's use of the term "86,” which Comey is accused of directing toward Trump when he posted an online photo of seashells arranged to show the numbers "86 47" in May 2025.

Gravano said that gangsters used the term to refer to killing someone — as in having a person "86-ed" — and that Comey had to know what it meant, based on his law enforcement experience.

An FBI agent requested a review of the bureau's file for the case against infamous mobster John Gambino, which Comey worked on as a young prosecutor, but didn't find any reference to "86," The Associated Press reported.

Gravano, who was a key cooperator in that case, also said he didn't recall discussing the term with Comey or hearing it in connection with the trial, according to the AP.

John Gleeson, a former mob prosecutor and federal judge, also gave Comey’s lawyers an affidavit that says “’86 in any form — numerals, letters, written, spoken — is not part of the mafia lexicon” and that claiming it’s “mafia jargon for ‘kill’ is preposterous.”

“I have never come into contact with a single recorded conversation where a mafia member uses ‘86’ in any way, shape, or form, let alone to refer to killing or murder,” he wrote. “Nor have I come into contact with any such reference to ‘86’ in my thousands of hours of debriefings and conversations with cooperating witnesses in mafia cases.”

Comey's lawyers also alleged that a top Justice Department official directed the Secret Service to conduct "unlawful" electronic tracking of his cellphone after he posted the photo of the seashells.

Court papers say the electronic surveillance included tracking Comey as he and his wife "stopped to visit the grave of their deceased son," according to the AP.

Colin Comey was nine days old when he died in 1995 of a treatable bacterial infection that a doctor and hospital failed to diagnose, a tragedy he revealed in his memoir A Higher Loyalty: Truth, Lies, and Leadership, USA Today reported shortly before it was published in 2018.

The North Carolina federal court filings show discussions among Secret Service personnel about "pinging" Comey's phone and a request to Verizon to provide his location over an "emergency" situation, CBS News said.

"At that time we did not believe that anyone's life was in immediate danger and legally it was a bad idea to ping the phone," an unidentified Secret Service official allegedly said in one message.

In a Wednesday statement to The Independent , a Justice Department spokesperson said: "On the specifics here, we decline to comment."

The Secret Service didn't immediately return an inquiry from The Independent.

Comey, who Trump fired as FBI director in 2017, was charged with two felonies in April over his social media post on grounds that it amounted to a threat against Trump, who's serving as America's 47th president.

This week's court filings seek dismissal of the charges and a hearing on the evidence in the case, which Comey — an outspoken Trump critic — blames on the president’s hatred of him.

“Ample objective evidence — much of which comes directly from government officials’ own public statements and admissions — establishes that the President’s animus toward Mr. Comey led to this vindictive and selective prosecution,” Comey’s lawyers wrote in one of the filings, according to the AP.

The White House declined to comment and instead referred The Independent to the DOJ, which has previously said: "A North Carolina grand jury indicted Comey, and he'll have his day in court like any other defendant."

The case is the second brought against Comey since Trump returned to the White House in 2025 after repeatedly telling his supporters: "I am your retribution."

The first indictment, in which Comey was accused of lying to Congress, was dismissed in November by a judge who ruled that the interim U.S. attorney who obtained it, former Trump lawyer Lindsey Halligan, had been illegally appointed.

The judge cited the same grounds for also tossing out unrelated mortgage fraud charges against New York Attorney General Letitia James. She oversaw the successful 2023 civil prosecution of Trump, a former real estate developer, for exaggerating his wealth to obtain business loans.

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