"I regret that you did not lead a better life."

A trip to the morgue has always been a parent's ultimate threat.

"I'll show you what life is really all about," a dad will say to a rebellious offspring, hoping to jolt them back into line.

Some desperate parents probably even end up going to the morgue to show their miscreant teens where they will end up if they don't stop carousing, driving fast, skipping class, etc.

Let's face it though, the odds of a teenager ending up on a coroner's slab are far less than the chance that they will just continue to screw-up into their 20s and 30s.

So rather than the morgue, it would be far more effective to plan a nice day trip to 219 S. Dearborn. That is the Dirksen Federal Building in Chicago where the criminal courtrooms are located.

On several occasions the past few weeks, I wish that the courtroom of Judge James B. Zagel had been jammed with wise-cracking, know-it-all teenagers and their parents.

Judge Zagel was sentencing several of the Chicago mobsters who were convicted in Operation Family Secrets. The trial of the five dastardly Outfit bosses had such a following, that the sentencings had to be held in an oversize ceremonial courtroom. But it was mostly just news jockeys, lawyers, people connected to the case, mob watchers and court buffs who were there.

So, let me report to you what Judge Zagel said that might have hit home with Jimmy "Tough as Nails" Teenager.

Most people are judged on the good things they do in life, Judge Zagel said.

But some people do things that are so bad, that they have to be judged only on those.

Zagel told the wise guy Joey Lombardo that "the worst things you have done are terrible and I see no regret." Then he sentenced him to life in prison.

Zagel told Lombardo, long known in mob circles as "The Clown," that in the end it is our actions that count, "not about our wits and our smiles" that we are judged.

Although he didn't say as much, I presume Judge Zagel was referring to our actions being judged both here on earth and the particular hereafter that you subscribe to.

It would not be the only reference to a higher power in federal court. Every time the proceedings are called to order it includes the prayer: "God save the United States." Interestingly, during all my years covering federal court cases I have never heard a person stand up and shout anything about separating church and state. But that is for another day.

Of course, the notion of judging someone's life based on the worst things that they do goes against the grain of what many people believe. "Look not on our sins but on the faith of your church" is a phrase heard during every Catholic Mass.

But at some point, as Zagel suggests, the scale tips from good to bad; honorable to evil; redeemable to lost. And that is the message for our kids to be learned from the case of these pathetic, aging mobsters: You never know where the tipping point is.

Last Thursday it was James Marcello up for sentencing. Mr. Marcello, of Lombard, was the highest-ranking member of the Chicago mob convicted in the Family Secrets case. Like Lombardo, he made lives miserable and sometimes killed people.

Judge Zagel told Marcello that he had better judgment and self-control than the other hoodlums around him. And then Zagel said perhaps the saddest thing you could ever tell another human being.

"I regret that you did not lead a better life."

Even that poignant description would sail past many teenagers, especially the gang bangers, truants, dropouts, shoplifters, substance abusers, loafers and others who just consider themselves entitled by birth.

The real bad kids probably wouldn't listen to a grey-haired judge in a black robe any more than they would care about seeing a 19-year old in the morgue.

Maybe they would notice this: at one point in a criminal sentencing, those who have been affected by a defendant's crime are allowed to talk to the court.

That happened during the Marcello sentencing.

Bob D'Andrea got up from the bench where he was sitting and walked to the podium. D'Andrea is a tough talking, rock-solid body builder and a drag racing aficionado-the kind of guy even a smart aleck teenager might respect.

Bob was 19 when his father was murdered with the butt of a shotgun in the back seat of a car that Marcello was driving. In court, he turned to Marcello and told the pudgy mobster that he preferred to administer his own "eye-for-an-eye" brand of justice but knew that wouldn't be American. So, he would settle for Marcello being locked up for life.

But then he told Marcello that his ultimate judgment would not be in the courtroom anyway. It would be by a higher authority.

"When He asks Mr. Marcello why he brought so much pain and misery to so many, I hope he has some answers," D'Andrea said. "Because that's not life. That's eternity."

• Chuck Goudie, whose column appears each Monday, is the chief investigative reporter at ABC 7 News in Chicago. The views in this column are his own and not those of WLS-TV. He can be reached by e-mail at chuckgoudie@gmail.com.