Possible mafia head arrested in The Hague, lawyer speaks of mistaken identity

A man was arrested in a restaurant in The Hague on Wednesday who, according to the Public Prosecution Service, is the infamous fugitive Sicilian mafia boss Matteo Messina Denaro. That reports Het Parool . But the suspect's lawyer says there has been a mistake of identity: the detainee would be another man from Liverpool.

The owner of restaurant Het Pleidooi in The Hague tells the newspaper that a police force with seven cars stopped for the case on Wednesday afternoon. Three men at a table were taken away blindfolded by officers with guns drawn.

The Public Prosecution Service confirms to the NOS that a man has been arrested at the request of the Italian authorities. According to the newspaper, 59-year-old Matteo Messina Denaro was the target of the action. He is seen as the capo di tutti capi of the mafia in Sicily, the leader Italy has been looking for for years.

massacres
Denaro has been in hiding since 1993. He is said to have been involved in the notorious murders of the investigating judges Falcone and Borsellino in Sicily in the early 1990s. He is also wanted for massacres that the cosa nostra caused in Rome, Florence and Milan during the same period.

The only question is whether the Dutch Public Prosecution Service has indeed managed to catch this big fish. Attorney Leon van Kleef, who represents the suspect, does not think so. Van Kleef says that the detainee is completely someone else: 54-year-old Mark L. from Liverpool, who met the lawyer years ago in a criminal case in which friends of L. were tried.

L. would have come to the Netherlands from his hometown in Spain for the grand prix at Zandvoort and was arrested during a dinner with his son in the restaurant.

Nightmare
According to lawyer Van Kleef, L. was transferred to the extra-security prison in Vught. It is unclear, according to him, how the judiciary came to this confusion. Van Kleef tells the NOS that DNA has been taken from his client. He hopes that it will soon become clear that it is not about the wanted mafia boss. "Of course it's a nightmare if this happens to you. You are having a bite to eat and you end up in the EBI."

Van Kleef is convinced that the arrested man is not the wanted Italian who has assumed a new identity as an Englishman. "Anything is possible, of course, but I'm willing to bet that there is a mistake."

The Public Prosecution Service says that an investigation is still being conducted into the identity of the suspect.