He is disliked and feared by most of the staff and other inmates, although, his toughness and racism is somewhat admired by Aryan Brotherhood leader Vernon Schillinger; Ortolani makes it known that the feeling is not mutual.

Although Ortolani is initially disgusted by the patients surrounding him on the ward, he begins to form a bond with Emilio Sanchez, a heroin addict who is in the end stages of AIDS after contracting HIV through sharing needles.

O'Reily uses his connections to allow Post entry to the hole, who then pours flammable liquid onto a comatose Ortolani, setting him on fire and burning him to death.

Ortolani is portrayed as callous, hotheaded, and bigoted, but is not without positive qualities such as kindness and mercy, which reveal themselves as the prospect of spending the rest of his life in prison begins to set in as a reality.

When Schillinger attempts to congratulate him for his assault on Keane, believing it to be racially motivated, Ortolani makes it clear that he does not want his admiration, nor does he respect or agree with his racist attitude.

During his interrogation, inmate Bob Rebadow says that God told him that Ortolani wanted to kill himself rather than spend the rest of his life in prison, away from his wife and children.