Mafia, 15 arrests between Palermo and Reggio Calabria: 440 kg of drugs seized
Wednesday 16th November 2022 03:47 AM

PALERMO – The carabinieri of the investigative unit of the operational department of the provincial command of Palermo, have implemented 15 precautionary measures (10 in prison and 5 under house arrest), issued by the investigating judge of Palermo at the request of the district anti-mafia directorate, for crimes of association aimed at the illicit trafficking of narcotic or psychotropic substances. Among the aggravating factors is also the use of the mafia method.

The blitz was triggered in Palermo and in the province of Reggio Calabria. The operation wiped out one of the most important drug supply channels for the province of Palermo. Months of interceptions, technical activities and stalking have made it possible to reconstruct the articulated criminal structure that dealt with finding the drug for the Palermo mafia districts of Porta Nuova, Brancaccio and Tommaso Natale – San Lorenzo, which has made it possible to acquire a serious circumstantial picture for suspects.

These were responsible for importing into the Palermo area, through various and consolidated supply channels, large consignments of narcotics and then placing them in the drug dealing squares of the capital, remaining in any case connected with the individual mafia joints territorially involved.

The investigation launched in September 2019 also led to the seizure of 440 kg of cocaine, crack and hashish. The investigators managed to place, at the top of the association, important men of honor (already definitively condemned for their belonging to the mafia association) of the mafia families of Palermo Centro and Partanna Mondello, who, assisted by other associates (among who also mafia affiliates of the district of Brancaccio – not drawn from the present measure as they were already subjected to a precautionary measure in another proceeding), operated in the round in the drug market, dealing both with suppliers operating in other regions – Campania and Calabria – and with drug dealers from Palermo, in charge of reselling the narcotics in retail.

Micalizzi, the trafficker of two worlds: he wanted to import drugs from Iran and Turkey into Palermo

The boss Riccobono's son-in-law, who had returned to the city after prison and a long exile imposed by the Corleonesi, aimed at old business. The Gico of finance intercepted it with a foreign broker. Objective: to reactivate the Middle Eastern track of the seventies

Really the criminal history of Palermo is veering towards the roaring seventies. Their networks of relationships are back with the old mafiosi: Michele Micalizzi, the 73-year-old son-in-law of the mafia boss Rosario Riccobono arrested on Wednesday by the carabinieri, aimed to reactivate the Middle Eastern drug trail. Through Iran and Turkey. Just as it happened before the advent of the Corleonesi; at the time, however, mainly basic morphine arrived, which was processed in the Sicilian refineries. Now, however, the mobsters discuss lots of cocaine and hashish.

The one starring Michele Micalizzi is yet to be told: it was the Gico of the Palermo economic and financial police nucleus who came across the international investments of the boss of Partanna Mondello who returned to freedom after twenty years in prison. He was in contact with an old trafficker from Palermo, Michele Mondino, and with a Florentine businessman. The 78-year-old Mondino is another name that brings us back to a past that seemed to have been forgotten by now: in the early 1980s he ended up in the investigations of the anti-mafia pool because he was considered close to the family of Stefano Bontate, that of Santa Maria di Gesù.

Another piece of the "losing" line-up. A past re-emerged in 2016 during an investigation into drug trafficking between Germany and Palermo, managed by Placido Anello, very close to the mafia family of Passo di Rigano, that of the Inzerillos. Here the circle closes: Riccobono, Bontate, Inzerillo. Between Micalizzi and Mondino there is already the expression of the Palermo mafia which had been undermined by the Corleonesi, now cleared through customs after the death of Riina, which took place in 2017.
But here it's not the names that count, rather the money. Both Micalizzi and Mondino, both the Inzerillos and the young Francesco Paolo Bontate (Stefano's son killed in the Mafia war) have treasures that have never been seized. With these capitals they restarted their business in Palermo. As if it were the seventies, when the drug lords were called Rosario Riccobono, Salvatore Inzerillo and Stefano Bontate.

Already last year, an investigation by Repubblica had told of the return of the losers to Palermo. And Michele Micalizzi's wife, Margherita Riccobono, had written to us on Facebook: "I feel like smiling - this is how her message began - it's true Rosario Riccobono had a treasure, but the treasure went away with him. How many things untrue writings, but I don't blame her, you are journalists doing your job, but I'm honest: why every time she talks about Riccobono she is so furious about a person she doesn't know?".

Margherita Riccobono's message also contained an appeal: "Let us move on, even if our hearts are broken. Let the dead, even the meanest, rest in peace. Rosario Riccobono was an exemplary father for me, he adored us daughters and if I were born a second time I would always want him again".
The arrest of Michele Micalizzi tells us that this story is far from closed. He was in charge of the substantial assets returned to the family in 2008. The Prevention Measures section of the Palermo court was unable to do anything else after discovering that the boss Rosario Riccobono, the mafia boss of Partanna Mondello, had never been given the preventive measure personal, which at the time was the prerequisite for the patrimonial one. An insurmountable legal problem. And the family safe, the "Magis" company, which manages properties in Palermo for ten million euros, has returned to the Riccobonos.

Micalizzi alternated drug deals with apparently lawful deals. From construction to trade. He tried to be cautious, but he ended up attending some summits as well. Seventies nostalgia.

Mafia summit: bosses acquitted, dangerousness to prove
Some meetings preceded the meeting of the new dome
THE VERDICT
It doesn't matter that some of the forbidden meetings between the mafiosi served to organize the meeting of the Cosa Nostra dome. Settimo Mineo , boss of Pagliarelli, who presided over the meeting of district leaders in 2018, Filippo Annatelli of Corso Calatafimi , Andrea Ferrante and Salvatore Sorrentino of Pagliarelli were acquitted because the fact does not exist.

Coup on the Milanese Cursoti: 24 arrests

https://news.italy24.press/trends/230606.html

An anti-mafia operation against 24 alleged members of the Milanese Cursoti clan was carried out last night by the Catania police. The investigation, coordinated by the District Anti-Mafia Directorate, hypothesizes, for various reasons, the crimes of mafia association, extortion, cocaine and marijuana trafficking, carrying and possession of firearms, and drug dealing. “The investigations highlighted, among other things, the involvement of the alleged members in the management of drug dealing squares in Catania, and in particular in the railway station area, where cocaine and marijuana were sold with revenues of 50,000 euros a month”.

'Scotch' whisky with machine gun bottle outrages Italy
8 hrs ago

https://www.heraldscotland.com/business_hq/23166836.scotch-whisky-machine-gun-bottle-outrages-italy/

@m2w, is Gianni Nicchi free or has he serve the 7 years after his first sentence?
Anyway he has already served the 13 years in L'Aquila under the 41-bis prison regime.

Palermo, definitive sentences for the bosses of Pagliarelli Rotolo and Nicchi
Inadmissible appeals and the penalties become definitive for the bosses of Palermo (Pagliarelli) Antonino Rotolo and Gianni Nicchi, definitively sentenced to 7 years and 4 months each, as well as Carmelo Cancemi and Salvatore Sorrentino. The trial was a residual section of Gotha, the maxi-investigation which between 20 and 30 June 2006 led to 90 arrests by the Flying Squad.

On January 21, 2008 , the Court of Palermo sentenced Nicchi, then a fugitive, to 15 years in prison. Due to the abbreviated procedure, Nicchi obtained a reduction of 1/3 of the sentence. As part of the Gotha trial, the Supreme Court confirmed the 13-year prison sentence on 12 October 2011.

i think he must serve still 7 years

Thanks I believe the enemies Sandro Lo Piccolo and Nicchi are both in L'Aquila.
Nicchi himself - the son of a mafioso sentenced to life imprisonment who married in the L'Aquila prison - had been commissioned to kill the two Lo Piccolos and dissolve them in acid because they were in favor of the return from America to Palermo of the uncomfortable Inzerillo family.

The boss Antonino Marchese, one of the most ruthless and never repentant killers of Cosa Nostra, died in his cell

The 65-year-old mafioso was imprisoned in Secondigliano, where he allegedly suffered a heart attack: the prosecutor ordered an autopsy to ascertain the causes of death. Sentenced to life imprisonment with the Maxi Trial, he has spent almost two thirds of his life behind bars. The Campania guarantor of the prisoners: "He had been ill for some time, it is inhumane not to let him die at home"



He was one of the most ruthless killers of Cosa Nostra and had been locked up in prison for over 40 years. And it was there that Antonino Marchese, 65, brother of Pino - the first repentant of the "winning" Corleonesi mafia - died in a cell in the Secondigliano penitentiary in Naples, but also of Vincenzina, the wife of boss Leoluca Bagarella , who committed suicide in 1995, as well as the nephew of Filippo Marchese, alias "milinciana", historic boss of Corso dei Mille and "administrator" of the death chamber of Sant'Erasmo.

To crush the mafioso - who has always denied having been part of Cosa Nostra - would have been a heart attack. The prosecutor of Naples who was on duty that day - December 1st - decided to order an autopsy anyway to ascertain the causes of death.

The Campanian guarantor of the prisoners, Samuele Ciambriello, confirmed the news to PalermoToday: "The death dates back to December 1st, Marchese had been ill for some time. In 41 years spent in prison, for a long time at 41 bis, he never obtained a permit Only a few weeks before his death, he was allowed to go out for a few hours, but remaining in Naples. A fact which, in my opinion, demonstrates the inhumanity and lack of piety even in the face of serious crimes: it could have been done so let him die at home. Instead he died in his cell."

Marchese was held with other ex 41 bis life sentences like him and, in light of his health problems, was assisted by the medical staff of the Secondigliano prison. On December 1st he would have felt ill and would have asked for help. The agents and the doctors would have helped him, but in vain.

Dozens and dozens of murders in which Marchese took part in the few years of his life that he spent as a free citizen. He was arrested in August 1983 and then sentenced to life imprisonment in the first Maxi-trial. Life imprisonment which he also remedied for the murder of Vincenzo Puccio, murdered in his cell in Ucciardone in 1988 with blows from a cast iron grill.

He has always spoken of his repentant brother as a "tragediator", arguing that "everything he says is infamy" and that "all his statements are all tragedies to obtain the benefits they give him", referring to those envisaged for the collaborators of justice. Instead, he never gave in, denying even the evidence in the trials and asking to be confronted with the very brother who accused him. And that's how he spent almost two-thirds of his life behind bars, where years ago he even got married. And that's where he died about ten days ago.

Trapani, the drug “cartel” aiming to raise prices: dozens of arrests

https://news.italy24.press/trends/266729.html

The Cosa Nostra fish: convictions and confiscated businesses

PALERMO – Fish supplies were a lucrative business for the Porta Nuova bosses. Paolo Calcagno, considered the regent of the district of Porta Nuova, and his right-hand man, Giuseppe Ruggeri, controlled the entire supply chain through the companies "World fish" and "Fresco gel".

The Court presided over by Daniela Vascellaro sentenced them to one year each in prison in continuation with the sentence for mafia inflicted in the main section of the process of which the one defined today was an excerpt.

“In Palermo everything revolves around me, maybe you didn't understand it”, said Ruggeri. In the Capo and Ballarò markets, the mafia control was suffocating. He even went so far as to choose what to sell and at what price. The bosses also decided how the stalls should be set up.

"In central Palermo the Mulè bosses are in charge": 9 arrests

PALERMO – Ballarò is an enclave of the Mulè family. The father Franco and the son Massimo dictated the law in the mafia family of Palermo centro, mandamento of Porta Nuova. They met in a shaving room to decide everything, even how the stalls of one of the historic markets of Palermo should be arranged.

Their names open the list of the nine arrested by the carabinieri of the investigative unit of the provincial command on the orders of the prosecutor Maurizio de Lucia, by the deputy Paolo Guido, and by the substitutes Giovanni Antoci, Gaspare Spedale and Luisa Bettiol.

The lifer father and the unexpected freedom

In 2016, the seventy-year-old Mulè went from life imprisonment to freedom. And he would have regained power, leading the mafia family (competent over the Capo, Ballarò, Kalsa and Vucciria districts) together with his son. He spent 23 years in prison, but he should have been there for life since he was also convicted of three murders.

And instead came the unexpected conversion of the sentence into thirty years by virtue of the Carotti law of 3 January 2000. It remained in force until the following 24 November. The law provided that with the abbreviated procedure the life sentence could be reduced to thirty years. Mulè, like other defendants on trial that year, had already passed the preliminary hearing phase, which is the moment in which an alternative rite such as the abbreviated one can be chosen.

And so Mulè, like other bosses, left prison early. The elderly boss of the Porta Nuova district had also spent the last period of detention under house arrest for serious health reasons.

The son sentenced to freedom

Massimo Mulè, nicknamed "u nicu", (he has a brother, Salvatore, known as "U papparieddu", ended up under accusation in the "Cupola 2.0" investigation, i.e. the one that blocked in the bud the re-foundation of the provincial commission, inactive since the arrest by Riina.

Massimo Mulè, referred to as a mafia boss, was however released from prison by the Review and was acquitted in the first instance. The appeal process - the prosecutors challenged the acquittal - is still ongoing. He returned to prison shortly after in a blitz that revealed the mafia imposition of bouncers in nightclubs. They sentenced him to 6 years in the first instance, but in the meantime he too was free this time . Next week there will be the appeal ruling and, according to the indictment, there is a risk of flight.

extortions and drugs

Now the new and urgent detention that must pass to the scrutiny of the judge for the preliminary investigations. According to the investigations of the carabinieri of the investigative unit, led by lieutenant colonel Salvatore Di Gesare, the Mulè collected the lace on the spot (no one reported), sometimes masking the collection of the money with the raffle, the lottery, of Cosa Nostra; they decided how the stalls should be arranged in the market and which goods should be sold to regulate competition; organized drug trafficking. Ballarò and the nearby streets were their enclave.

The names of the 9 arrested

This is the complete list of those arrested: Francesco Mulè, 75, Massimo Mulè, 50, Gaetano Badalamenti, 53, Francesco Lo Nardo, 63, Giuseppe Mangiaracina, 42, Alessandro Cutrona, 38, Leandro Calogero Naso, 28 years old, Salvatore Gioeli, 56 years old, Antonio Lo Coco, 67 years old.

in the anti-mafia operation "Kynara" police arrested 31 members of the Cappello-Bonaccorsi clan based in Catania on charges of mafia-type association, drug trafficking and illegal possession of weapons. The clan bought cocaine from the 'Ndrangheta in order to distribute it across the city of Catania. Among the arrested Michele Vinciguerra, reputed head of the Cappello-Bonaccorsi family in the neighborhood of San Cristoforo.

The Cappello family have been hit a few times the last years, we may see the Santapaola's, their main rivals, profit from their problems.
Superboss Nitto Santapaola was born in the same degraded neighbourhood of San Cristoforo.

Antonio D’Alì, final sentence to six years for external competition in mafia association. The former Berlusconi senator will go to jail

https://news.italy24.press/local/269904.html

Whole D’Alì family is corrupted and worked with mafia for decades, this is surprise he will actually serve time.

While his conviction is good news, he most likely won't stay in jail for long, politicians always weasel their way out by claiming to be too ill or too old, and are granted house arrest, which in Italy isn't even real "arrest", since you can even leave the house at certain hours of the day and there are no guards at the door to check whether the criminal stays inside even outside those hours. It would be a miracle if D'Ali actually does his whole time in prison, it's literally impossible in my opinion.

The writing on courtroom walls "La legge e' uguale per tutti" ("The law is equal for everyone") is bullshit imo....Some people are "more equal" than others, and D'Ali will surely turn out to be one of them, unfortunately.

Cuffaro and Dell'Utri did some time in prison anyway

Yes, but Dell'Utri was in prison for 3 years only I think, while the sentence was 7 years.

Mafia, the repentant: "Messina Denaro made a pact with the 'Ndrangheta"
The background revealed by the collaborator of justice.
TURIN
of editorial staff
2' OF READING
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TURIN- "In 2015 Matteo Messina Denaro and other Cosa Nostra bosses had made a pact with the bosses of the 'Ndrangheta to 'work together and become one family'". These are the words of a collaborator of justice heard by the Turin prosecutor's office in the context of the Carminius-Fenice maxi-trial on the presence of organized crime in the Carmagnola area. The judges of the court of Asti reported them in the reasons for the sentence pronounced last June (sixteen convictions and eleven acquittals). Precisely in Carmagnola and in the surrounding areas, according to the pentito, the agreement became operational: the men of Cosa Nostra and the 'Ndrangheta worked together.

“How much does a man of honor weigh? What foot size do you wear? How many horses do you have?”. It is a kind of quiz that was imposed on a man, now a collaborator of justice, when the bosses evaluated his return to the Cosa Nostra. This is what he himself told the Turin DDA. His statements converged in the Carminius-Fenice maxi-trial, celebrated by the court of Asti, on the presence of the 'Ndrangheta in the Carmagnola area (Turin). The man (considered "overall credible" by the Asti judges) explained that in the past, before his arrest, he had been an affiliate of Cosa Nostra, and that, when Carmagnola arrived, he was presented with a boss who, knowing the his past, he decided to put him back in the organization. First, however, he was subjected to a kind of test: in March 2016 he was required to carry out thefts of motor hoes to be sent to Calabria and to deal with drug and weapons transfers. Then came the time for the three questions to which he gave "the correct answer". A man of honor weighs "like a feather scattered in the wind"; his foot number is "the right one to account for this honored company"; as for the horses, it is "the right horse to account for this honored family". The man said he began to reflect on a possible collaboration with justice in November 2017, when six hand grenades were brought to Carmagnola to be used for an attack "on a person disliked by the organization of whom, however, I know nothing" , and feared being involved "in a massacre".

He turned himself in in the early afternoon of Wednesday 14 December in the notorious Opera prison in Milan.
Messina Denaro's father found him a job as an armed guard to the D'Ali family.

Messina Denaro started as armed guard to D'Ali family , they owned private bank in Sicily , were also part of masonic lodge P2. They are very powerful , that's why i am surprised he will actually serve time.

The family belongs to the wealthy elite on the Island.

Palazzo D’Alì TRAPANI
This symbolic city palace, testimony of the expansion and urban mutation of the city at the end of the nineteenth century, beginning of the twentieth, is now the seat of the Municipality.

The palace (1884) is characterized by an architecture in neoclassical style, and binds its name and its history to that of Senator Giuseppe D’Ali, who made it the sumptuous residence of his family.

In the Porta Nuova district the figure of Teresa Marino stands out, wife of Tommaso Lo Presti, known as il Pacchione, she has led the family for several years, now serving a 10 year sentence.

A Catania court handed down jail sentences to 39 people after convicting them for diverting a Good Friday religious procession to the house of a mafia family. The 39 people had diverted the parade to force it to pay homage to an imprisoned mafia boss.

In 2016, a group of people were carrying a statue of Jesus Christ through the village of San Michele Di Ganzaria during Easter. The accused individuals are reported to have stopped the procession and forced it to pass in front of the house of the mafia godfather Francesco La Rocca.

La Rocca was serving a life sentence at the time for mafia-related crimes. However, his wife came out of the house to greet the wellwishers and made an offering.

A Sicilian archbishop said that the sentence would deter others from doing anything similar in future.

The group was convicted of disturbing a religious event and incitement to commit crimes. The eight ringleaders received three-year terms, and the others were sentenced to between six months and two years, nine months in jail.

One of the largest casino entrepreneurs in the world accuses the Netherlands and Italy of having commissioned the Israeli company NSO to have his iPhone hacked. He did so a year ago in a lawsuit before a court in the US state of New Jersey. Apple has informed the man about a possible hack. A second case is now pending in the United States.

The civil cases were started by Francesco Corallo, a businessman and former money laundering suspect, with both Dutch and Italian nationality, who lives in Sint Maarten. In the New Jersey case, he asked for a jury to find that the companies NSO Technologies, Berkeley Research Group, and Q CyberTechnologies committed multiple wrongful acts against him and wants damages for that.

In 2016 there was an investigation against Corallo for tax evasion and bribery. He was arrested and extradited to Italy but returned to Sint Maarten. There he spent a total of 256 days in extradition detention. The European Court of Human Rights later ruled that this was under 'inhumane circumstances'.

There was no conviction in a criminal case for money laundering or the other financial offenses with which he was associated both in Italy and in the Kingdom.

It has been established that Corallo in any case owns casinos on Sint Maarten and in the Dominican Republic. He also acknowledges that he has major interests in Italy, including legal gambling.

Corallo's interests in the online casino and sports betting business can only be speculated. This sector is by definition global and huge turnovers are achieved.

In every district of Palermo, the mafia has organized "a parallel structure" for the collection of sports bets, supported by illegal agencies masquerading as service centers. Betting money is collected on the street. It's the old totonero, updated for modern times.

Every mafia family, not only in Palermo, would have its unsuspected contact person for the business: in recent years, several entrepreneurs in the sector have been arrested in Sicily: the Palermitans Benedetto Bacchi and Salvatore Rubino ( there is also an investigation involving dozens of suspects, but in which the aggravating circumstance of mafia fell ), Enzo Romeo from Messina, Carlo Cattaneo and Calogero Jonn Luppino from Trapani.

And then there's neighborhood work. That of capobastone and picciotti who collect old-fashioned bets on the street.

Mafia: drugs and extortion, 10 arrests in the Agrigento area

https://news.italy24.press/local/329670.html