The son of a Bonanno crime family associate who was critically wounded in an attempted hit outside his sprawling Bronx home is refusing to cooperate with investigators, law enforcement sources said.
FBI investigators descended on Salvatore Zottola’s waterfront home in Locust Point on Wednesday afternoon, but were forced to cull surveillance footage from a neighboring yacht club because Zottola has denied them access to his houses’ cameras, sources said.
Zottola — shot three times by a still-unapprehended gunman while walking to his car Wednesday morning — is heavily sedated at Jacobi Medical Center, but has spoken enough to investigators to make clear he refuses to help, according to sources.
It’s believed, however, that the 41-year-old victim knew his attacker, sources said.
The gunman sped off in a waiting dark Nissan sedan.
Investigators are looking into the possibility that the attack was a bloody message to Zottola’s father, Sylvester — a reputed Bonanno-family associate who himself has been roughed up at least three times since last year, sources said.
In September, the 71-year-old was walking near his Hobart Avenue home nearby in The Bronx when an assailant clubbed him over the head, sources said.
A gun-wielding thug tried unsuccessfully to force the elder Zottola into a car at Meagher Avenue and the Throgs Neck Expressway in November, sources added.
The most vicious run-in came on a late December night when Sylvester Zottola walked in on three burglars ransacking his home.
A burglar pulled a knife and stabbed Zottola in the neck, putting him in critical condition in Jacobi Medical Center — the same hospital where his son is now recuperating.
Last month, the elder Zottola found himself in cuffs for shooting an unlicensed gun at an unidentified man who he claims drew on him outside his home, authorities said.
Zottola’s ties to the Bonannos include an incident in the early 2000s when acting boss Vincent “Vinny Gorgeous” Basciano ordered some goons to rough up a rival who’d been hassling Zottola over his video-poker-machine racket.
Basciano is currently serving a life sentence for the 2004 murder of a Bonanno associate and a second life sentence for a 2001 slaying.
Zottola was scheduled to appear in Bronx Criminal Court on Wednesday on weapons-possession charges when news of the attack on his son broke, sources said.
Salvatore Zottola — who has no prior arrests, sources said — was home alone.
His wife and children were staying at the Jersey Shore when the attempt was made on his life, neighbors said.