Cocaine, Dia: "Cosa Nostra seeks autonomy from the 'Ndrangheta"

The seizure off the eastern coast of Sicily relaunches the perspectives put forward in the latest six-monthly report

The seizure of two tons of cocaine off the eastern coast of Sicily relaunches the prospects put forward by the Dia in its latest six-monthly report, which indicates a three-way game (Cosa nostra, 'Ndrangheta and Camorra) for drug supply, but with the Sicilian mafia in search of autonomy and a new international role.

«In drug trafficking – reads Dia's six-monthly report – Cosa Nostra commits its best resources to the coordination and management of markets and drug dealing squares, the latter entrusted to criminal groups sometimes directly affiliated. In the ultra-regional dimension, it establishes commercial relations and forges alliances or forms of cooperation with other mafia groups (such as 'Ndrangheta and Camorra) for the supply of larger quantities, even on a large scale".

«In particular – continues the Report – the investigative results of the first half of 2022 have demonstrated how the Cosa Nostra has kept open a preferential channel of negotiation with the Calabrian 'ndrine especially for the supply of cocaine. It cannot be excluded that Cosa Nostra may, in the short term, manage to free itself from the supply channels mentioned due to the first attempts to restore the old flows with suppliers from the American continent, so as to regain the role of international player in the drug trafficking".

Here are some important names in the drug world, Calabria and Campania are the traditional regions from which drugs arrive in Sicily, but in Palermo someone had decided to invest in a new route.

Palermo, the mafia boss changes and drug wholesalers change
The choice fell on a historical surname

by Riccardo Lo Verso
MARCH 23, 2023, 8PM

PALERMO - The handover between the old and the new mafia boss of Bagheria marked the change of drug suppliers. Onofrio Catalano, to whom they contested the criminal management marked by debts, in 2020 handed over the baton of command to Massimiliano Ficano.

This is how the magistrates of the district anti-mafia directorate and the carabinieri of the investigative unit of the carabinieri of the provincial command of Palermo reconstructed in the blitz that today brought 17 people to prison.

Catalano, during the forced absence of the regent of the district of Bagheria, the prisoner Giuseppe Scaduto, bought drugs in Palermo. His suppliers would have been Daniele Cardinale and Francesco Paolo Catalano. The latter, in particular, has always been linked to the Porta Nuova mafia.

Catalano and his right-hand man, Giuseppe Cannata, would have submitted to the will of Ficano. The choice for the new suppliers would have fallen on Stefano Marino, a man of the Roccella mafia family, and one of the best known names for drug trafficking in Palermo.

The new precautionary custody order signed by the judge for preliminary investigations Antonella Consiglio reaches him in prison, where he is already detained in the context of another investigation which cost him a heavy sentence.

Marino also spent a period on the run. He hadn't been found at home on the night of February 7, 2008 when agents from the Flying Squad, the Central Operations Service and the FBI arrested more than sixty people. Those were the days of the 'Old Bridge' operation.

The new mafia had reactivated the "old bridge" with the bosses who emigrated to the States. Marino was accused of having managed numerous extortions and maintained contact with prominent members of mafia families from different districts. They arrested him the following summer. He was a fugitive, but at sea with his wife and children. The agents of the organized crime section tracked him down in a villa in Altavilla Milicia. Once he finished serving his sentence, Stefano Marino went into business in the funeral services sector.

Catalano told his wife that he had gone "to get the thing", together with his "partner": "... this is a house that I took over with my partner ... in the sense that he anticipates and we share what I earn".

The boss of Kalsa Lauricella and three others stopped: "They wanted to reconstitute the mafia family"

Carabinieri blitz between Palermo and Villabate. The investigations, coordinated by the district anti-mafia prosecutor's office, revealed the attempt by Cosa Nostra to reassert itself on the territory by focusing on two cornerstones: extortion and drug dealing. Salvatore, son of Antonio "u scintilluni", was preparing to flee,

In the aftermath of the Cupola 2.0 anti-mafia operation, and after a few releases, they allegedly tried to reconstitute the Villabate mafia family by trying to extort, as documented by the investigators, some important entrepreneurial realities. In the front row was Salvatore Lauricella, 46 years old and son of the Kalsa boss Antonio (known as "u scintilluni"), already convicted. The Carabinieri of the Operational Department of the Provincial Command of Palermo arrested four people under investigation for mafia-type criminal association and extortion. In addition to Lauricella, the others involved are: Giovanni La Rosa, born in Palermo, 54 years old; Francesco Terranova, born in Villabate, 49 years old; Vito Traina, born in Palermo, 35 years old.

The investigations coordinated by the district anti-mafia prosecutor's office, culminating in the operation called "Luce", would have made it possible to "document the reorganization maneuver - reads a note from the provincial command - put in place by some top leaders of Cosa Nostra who have returned to freedom after having served the sentences to which they had been definitively sentenced". The mafia family of Villabate, which fell into disgrace after the collaboration of the repentant Francesco Colletti who revealed some important background, would have tried to reassert itself in the area by avoiding hitting the economically more fragile traders and entrepreneurs, limiting thefts and robberies and above all controlling the sale retail of drugs in Villabate.

The investigations then accelerated because one of the suspects, Salvatore Lauricella himself, allegedly attempted to escape so as to lose track of himself. The operation "gives back a picture in line with other recent precautionary measures, namely the one according to which Cosa Nostra would not have resigned at all to succumbing but would have undertaken, through reference to its own rules, to reorganize itself in order to present itself on the territory with greater credibility and authority".

Cosa Nostra: between ''new'' scions and old bosses, the historical mafia rules in Palermo
Jamil El Sadi April 22, 2023
In the new mapping of districts, the names Guttadauro, Lo Piccolo and Biondino return
An old mafia that makes itself "new" and that advances, or at least tries to, reorganizing the mandates between one blitz and another. This is the image that emerges from the six-monthly report of the Dia and from the latest investigations by the investigative bodies regarding the Cosa Nostra in Palermo. Names and surnames of "old peaks" and young offspring. Mafiosi, and presumed such, who command the historic districts of Palermo. A Cosa Nostra that is renewed thanks to those who have seen the dawn of a new day after prison, and those, on the other hand, who have never seen the "sun" set. Rebuilding the updated map of mafia power, like " S" did, it appears evident that for the associations of Cosa Nostra in Palermo and those of the western provinces of Sicily "the prolonged absence at the top of a solid and recognized leadership" on the one hand favors the affirmation at the head of mandates and families of new exponents who boast a 'mafia family origin (of the real "children of art"); on the other hand, however, it allows the elderly men of honor who have returned to freedom to regain territorial hegemony.

In Porta Nuova, for example, Nunzio Milano was released last April after his last release after serving a 9-year prison sentence. But he is not the only Milan to be free again. Nunzio's brother Salvatore , alias Totuccio, and his son Nicola came out before Nunzio . The latter linked to Nicola Ingarao (he was his godfather), who was massacred at the behest of Salvatore Lo Piccolo . A direct retaliation against Pagliarelli's life sentence boss Nino Rotolo who had declared war on Tommaso Natale, alias "the baron".

Now close to release also the defendants convicted in the "Ghiaccio" trial which revealed the role of Giuseppe Guttadauro , known as "the doctor", former head physician of the Civic Hospital of Palermo - already ended up in prison 22 years ago, a leading exponent of Cosa nostra Palermitan, involved in the past in the investigation into the moles at the DDA in which the former president of the Region Totò Cuffaro was investigated - arrested on 14 February together with his son, Mario Carlo Guttadauro . Guttadauro would have organized a drug trade with foreign countries, financed by some Palermitans, opening a channel for the acquisition of cocaine with South America and with an Albanian for the supply of hashish.

Free, albeit with some restrictions, Giovanni “ Johnny ” Lucchese, the boss of Brancaccio who "reversed" and no longer wanted to collaborate with the justice , Claudio D'Amore , Giuseppe Caserta and Vincenzo Vella . The latter had returned to prison on charges of political-Mafia electoral exchange on the occasion of the last administrative elections in Palermo because he had been intercepted in a conversation with Francesco Lombardo , candidate for the Council of Brothers of Italy. " You personally get a few votes here, you do ", so the mafioso from Corso dei Mille reassured him in the face of the request for support - not at all veiled - made by the man fromGiorgia Meloni , who in return would have promised favors in the field of private construction and urban planning: " I'm in the urban planning commission... I'm in private construction, you understand that as soon as there's a problem here I jump.. And you call me... ". Vella was then released from prison by the Court of Review because the crime was classified as electoral corruption.

Returning to the mandates, it is vitally important for the investigators to keep their attention on the Porta Nuova mandate which, according to some wiretaps, is allegedly headed by Salvatore Milano , brother of Nunzio . With the release of Tommaso Lo Presti , alias "the long", which took place in April 2020, the mandate of Porta Nuova has seen a change. In fact, in January 2021, under the direction of Lo Presti, the definitive handover of the district cash register would have taken place between Incontrera and Giuseppe Autori , a fugitive since last July 6 after having managed to escape the "Vento" blitz.

As for the Noce, the name in the spotlight is that of Franco Picone , arrested in 2006 in Operation Gotha which led to the arrest of Bernardo Provenzano . Even at the Noce they were released from prison. Among these are Pierino Di Napoli , who returned to Palermo in November 2020 after a long period of detention in San Gimignano. In the district of Pagliarelli, however, Francesco Annabella , Giuseppe and Antonio La Innusa are free again . At Arenella-Acquasanta Stefano Fidanzati , who returned to freedom in 2018, continues to exert considerable influence.

Finally, in San Lorenzo, the "old" advances and there is always one name: Biondino. In circulation is the nephew of Salvatore Biondino , Giuseppe , old right-hand man and driver of Totò Riina .

As Dia points out, it is important to remember that "the traditional status of 'man of honor' is permanent, it implies an unconditional sharing of the aims pursued by the criminal association to which he belongs and is interrupted only with death or with the choice to collaborate with justice. They are recognized as having the authority deriving from a significant influence on the territory, even in the absence of a formal investiture".

In short, there are many important names. And they foreshadow that, despite the operations, the raids and the arrest of the superb Matteo Messina Denaro , Cosa nostra - in this case from Palermo - continues its business and tries to reorganize itself, witnessing a generational change which, however, always calls historical names of the Palermo mafia.

The mafia controlled the contracts, seized assets for 10 million

The mafia controlled the contracts in the Catania area, to the point that the boss was able to control the various public tenders monopolistically. And in this way the Cosa nostra was given lifeblood . On the basis of these investigations, assets for several 10 million euros were seized. Also in the crosshairs of the companies that would have facilitated the mafia.

Assets for 10 million euros were seized by the carabinieri of the Ros of Catania from Gioacchino Francesco La Rocca, known as "Gianfranco". He is the son of the historic mafia boss Francesco, known as "Ciccio", who died in December 2020. He also seals the assets of the entrepreneurs Giuseppe Ciriacono and Giuseppe Spitale. The provision issued by the Catania court at the request of the Etna Dda in the context of the "Agorà" investigation where, among other things, companies and entrepreneurs believed to be contiguous to the Caltagirone mafia family had emerged .

Italy's top court upholds acquittals in case alleging pact between mafia and state officials
By Marco Carta and Angelo Amante
ROME, April 27 (Reuters) - Italy's highest court on Thursday upheld acquittal verdicts in a major mafia trial based on allegations that the state had colluded with Sicilian mobsters after a deadly wave of bombings in the 1990s.

The ruling, which is definitive and cannot be appealed, marks the final chapter of a case that drew widespread attention over the last decade as it involved former high-ranking state officials, police, mob bosses and politicians.

Prosecutors alleged that state representatives had negotiated with the mob following a string of mafia bombs and assassinations, including those of prominent anti-mafia magistrates Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino.

Defendants including Marcello Dell'Utri, a close aide to former Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, and three retired Carabinieri police officials were initially convicted in 2018, but an appeals trial overturned the ruling three years later.

The original verdict said Dell'Utri had brokered a deal with the mob to stop the attacks.

After being acquitted in 2021, Dell'Utri - who got a seven-year sentence in a separate mafia-related case in 2014 - called the trial "monstrous".

"I was convinced I hadn't done anything (wrong), I know my job, I know that if I had made a mistake I would have realised it," former Carabinieri official Mario Mori told reporters after the court confirmed his acquittal.

Two mobsters involved in the case, including Leoluca Bagarella, a convicted killer for the Corleone mafia family, were cleared due to the statute of limitations, which came into force after the court downgraded the charges against them.

Prosecutors brought the defendants to trial on suspicion they began talks with the mafia in 1992 after judge Falcone, his wife and three bodyguards were assassinated by a bomb placed under a motorway in 1992.

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Magistrate Borsellino was killed two months later, and prosecutors believed he had learned of, and opposed, the negotiations.

Cosa Nostra stepped up the pressure in 1993 with unprecedented mainland attacks on cultural and church targets, including the Uffizi Gallery in Florence. Ten people were killed in Milan and Florence.

After 1993, the attacks abruptly stopped.

Palermo, the boss Vernengo has died: his escape in pajamas risked bringing down the Andreotti government
April 27, 2023
He was 81 years old, had been ill for some time and was staying in a retirement home due to his precarious physical condition
mafia, Palermo, Chronicle
Pietro Vernengo
The boss of Corso dei Mille Pietro Vernengo, known as u Tistuni , the Testone , died in Palermo : he was 81 years old, had been ill for some time and was staying in a residence for the elderly due to his precarious physical conditions.

His escape in pajamas, on October 15, 1991, almost brought down the Andreotti government and unleashed endless controversies about the bosses who stayed outside prisons, comfortable and without problems: Vernengo was under hospital arrest at the oncologist Maurizio Ascoli, but he did not supervise him none and went off undisturbed. He was captured a few months later, a fugitive at his house, with his wife in the Ponte Ammiraglio area, the district of which he was originally from.

Previously, a defendant in the maxi trial, where he was answerable for a hundred homicides, he had received life imprisonment for only one, that of Vito Rugnetta, a loyalist of the superkiller - later collaborator of justice - Totuccio Contorno, who refused to betray his friend and was tortured and killed. The victim's mother courageously showed up in the bunker room of the Ucciardone prison with the photo of her son and asked for justice for him, obtaining it.

Vernengo's escape, in a period in which Cosa nostra was in hiding - more or less gilded - was a huge blow to the credibility of the state: less than two months earlier, on 29 August 1991, had been killed entrepreneur-courage Libero Grassi and the circumstances in which Vernengo had left brought the government and the then Minister of Justice Claudio Martelli to a very heavy grip, with the revocation of easy hospitalizations and hospital arrests of extremely dangerous mafia bosses, who until then had they had enjoyed.

Modern mafia: Italy’s organised crime machine has changed beyond recognition in 30 years

https://theconversation.com/modern-...ed-beyond-recognition-in-30-years-198352

Drug trafficking and car theft, 68 arrests by the Catania DDA

https://techjaun.com/drug-trafficking-and-car-theft-68-arrests-by-the-catania-dda-il-tempo/

«Sicilian organized crime – reads the Dia report – continues to count drug trafficking, the management of online betting rounds, extortion declined in all its forms among the main sources of income and, with particular reference in the Palermo area, the handling and laundering of precious metals - the proceeds of robberies and thefts - through the complicity of commercial enterprises of the "buy gold" type.

The investigative results and the declarations of the collaborators document how Cosa Nostra encourages its acolytes to "collect" as much gold as possible in consideration of the high value of the metal...

Immersive Mafia Museum Will Open Its Doors in Palermo

https://americadomani.com/immersive-mafia-museum-will-open-its-doors-in-palermo/

I take it you didn't care for the chart, huh Hollander? Lol

Son of Sicilian mafia boss Totò Riina not welcome in Corleone: "We want to leave our mafia past behind us"

The Sicilian town of Corleone wants Salvuccio Riina, son of the notorious mafia boss Totò Riina, to leave. Salvuccio Riina was released last month after a long prison sentence and went back to live in Corleone. But the town does not like that and has passed a resolution to remove Riina from there. "Corleone wants to leave his mafia past behind. Even by repelling unwanted fellow citizens."
Kathleen Heylen
Fri 12 May12:37
Corleone, a farming town in western Sicily. In the 1960s and 1970s, people mainly lived from agriculture and cattle breeding. It would have remained a meaningless place were it not for the fact that Corleone is the birthplace of Italy's most notorious mafia bosses. Luciano Leggio for example, Bernardo Provenzano, but especially Totò Riina. As leaders of the Cosa Nostra, the Sicilian mafia, they sowed death and destruction in the second half of the 20th century.

The grip of the Corleonesi , as the kingpins were called, was enormous. It inspired the American writer Mario Puzo to write the book "The godfather", in which the (fictional) mafia family Corleone rules. The movie trilogy of the same name, starring Marlon Brando as Vito Corleone and Al Pacino as Michael Corleone, made Corleone's reputation as a mob capital almost ineradicable.

The town of Corleone has long been bored with its status as the cradle of the Mafia and is making frantic efforts to rid itself of it. But the arrival of Guiseppe Salvatore "Salvuccio" Riina, one of Totò Riina's sons, does no good. Salvuccio (46) was released in April after serving 9 years in prison and has returned to live in Corleone. And the city council doesn't like that.

Corleone wants to put his mafia past behind him. Even by repelling unwanted fellow citizens.

City Council of Corleone
The city council now haspassed a resolutionin which they request that Riina move out. "We want to send a loud and clear message once again: Corleone wants to put his mafia past behind him. Even by repelling unwanted fellow citizens. Like Salvuccio Riina, who has never distanced himself from the despicable crimes of his father, Totò. The reputational damage that the Riina family has brought to the city is enormous and difficult to recover."

The resolution has been forwarded to the police, but the final decision to remove Salvuccio from Corleone rests with the courts in the Sicilian capital of Palermo.

Salvatore "Totò" Riina has been called "the mafia boss of mafia bosses". As a Corleonese, he seized total power within the Cosa Nostra in the 1970s, after his predecessor Luciano Leggio, also from Corleone, had paved the way. At that time, Sicily was a major hub for the heroin trade to the United States. Riina became obsessed with the "narcodollars" he saw flowing to other mafia families in Sicily, and he wanted it all for himself.

Riina took the already existing mafia violence to a new level of brutality. He eliminated his criminal opponents on a large (and gruesome) scale and targeted prosecutors, journalists and judges who stood in his way. He would be responsible for the deaths of hundreds of people. Riina was also behind the murder of investigating judges Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino, who brought many mafiosi to justice. Those murders shocked Italy and launched a major operation that would eventually lead to his arrest. Riina had been in jail since 1993, under the strictest prison regime. He passed away in 2017.

Toto Riina had four children. Two of his sons followed in their father's criminal footsteps. His eldest son, Giovanni, was ordered at the age of 19 to strangle a kidnapped businessman, his ritual entry into the Cosa Nostra. He was sentenced to life in prison in 1996.

Giuseppe Riina (46), his youngest son, who should now disappear from Corleone, was in prison for extortion, money laundering and ties to the mafia. But he also came into contact with the court earlier. He does not hide his sympathy for his father and rather wrote a book that caused quite a stir in Italy.

the Riina's are like the Gotti's, people are tired of them lol

what has come of the famiglia corleone?

-by this i mean the family that operates in the corleone area...NOT the faction that took over cosa nostra from late 1970's at least until 1993 capture of salvatore riina. and i dont want to start a debate on that specific timeline or who succeeded riina first whether it was bagarella or provenzano. or for that matter if we can use the same "corleonesi" term to describe cosa nostra under the leadership of bernardo provenzano. i am more looking for the present day leaders/members of the corleone family.

- there does appear to exist different factions/sides of this family. i wont try to list specific titles, structure etc. or a long list of alleged associates more the core of the family.

1. the remaining family of salvatore riina and his siblings. i will call this the grizzaffi/riina faction.

2. the lo bue faction.

3. the gariffo faction.



grizzaffi/riina faction

1. giovanni grizzaffi
-son of caterina riina, sister to salvatore, making giovanni salvatores nephew. it has been reported that grizzaffi is or wants to lead the family and would have disputed leadership of rosario lo bue.

2. francesco grizzaffi-brother to giovanni
3.salvatore grizzaffi- nephew to salvatore, not a brother of francesco or giovanni.

4. giuseppe salvatore riina
-son of salvatore. released in 2012 and working as secretary for a social organization in padua,italy. i include only because he does have a criminal record and he is the only son of salvatore not imprisoned. salvatores other son giovanni is imprisoned for life.

5. gaetano riina-brother of salvatore, currently under house arrest until may 2024.


lo bue faction

1. rosario salvatore lo bue
-alleged current capofamiglia of corleone family. had served under bernardo provenzano helping him to elude authorities.

2. leoluca lo bue-son of rosario.

3. calogero giuseppe lo bue-brother to rosario.
4. nunzio labruzzo-son in law to calogero.


the gariffo faction

1. carmelo gariffo
-nephew to b. provenzano, his mother is maria provenzano.

2. antonio gariffo-cousin of carmelo.

3.salvatore gariffo-nephew of b. provenzano, unsure of relation to antonio and carmelo.

-so that gives a total of 12 "core members"...obviously there is more associates/members of this family but again that wasnt my goal here with this post. i realize it is possible i have posted something similar before but the article about giuseppe riina piqued my interest again.

who would the leaders be of this family?
capofamiglia=boss?
reggente=acting boss?
sottocapo=underboss?
consigliere=?

i think Rosario Lo Bue is the boss of Corleone family and mandamento
Giovanni Grizzaffi is reggente/acting boss
Gaetano Riina consigliere

I also wonder the role of Leoluca Bagarella

yes bagarella is a question for sure. he is imprisoned for several lives. this in no way takes him out of the picture as far as influence goes. i am not aware of any relatives or close associates remaining out on street, aside from i guess some listed previously above.

i didnt want to get involved in the possible succession after riinas capture as it creates confusion still to this day. did riina remain the overall BOSS OF BOSSES (i know a title that creates debate) right up until 2017 death (a theory i dont believe in), was bagarella his immediate successor as B.O.B.? or just of the famiglia corleone? or was provenzano the alleged B.O.B. from say 1995 on wards to his capture in 2006?

i will have to go back to a couple good books i have for clarity i think.

after the arrest of Totò Riina Cosa Nostra split into two factions, one led by Bagarella and the other by Provenzano; some say Bagarella was boss of bosses from 1993 to 1995, before his arrest...

Bagarella still is a very important figure in Cosa Nostra. Don Luchino even at 41-bis still has contacts to the outside world.

He is boss for years. I have no idea what is the role of Bagarella i mean i don't know how capable he is of leading , because he clearly has mental issues.

Buscetta on Bagarella: “I prefer not to speak about him; I think he doesn’t belong to human species; he probably had also mental and physical problems because when we played soccer in the prison’s courtyard he kicked the ball with two foots at the same time; have you ever seen a similar thing? In prison everybody feared him; I remember we stayed three months together in the prison’s infirmary and the only words he told me were good morning and good evening, nothing else”.

Mafia, maxi-confiscation of 65 million from three entrepreneurs from Gela

Assets and companies worth 65 million euros were confiscated from three entrepreneurs from Gela - Salvatore Luca, Rocco Luca and Francesco Antonio Luca - known in the car trade and real estate sector and believed to be close to the Rinzivillo mafia family. The provision, carried out by the Guardia di Finanza of Caltanissetta, was issued by the Prevention Measures Section on the proposal of the District Anti-Mafia Directorate. The three entrepreneurs are currently accused in a criminal trial for external competition in a mafia association: they allegedly reinvested large capitals, deemed by the court to be of illicit origin, in numerous companies formally owned by their family members and active in the construction and car resale sectors.

The Algerian, the Palermitans and 3 tons of "smoke": 8 arrests
Mobile squad operation. An elegant businessman stalked at the airport
THE INVESTIGATION
by Riccardo Lo Verso
MAY 17, 2023, 8:09 PM
2' OF READING 0 Comments Share
PALERMO - Eight arrests for drugs in Palermo. The blitz is from the mobile squad. The judge for preliminary investigations Lirio Conti accepted the request of the prosecutors Giovanni Antoci and Maria Rosaria Perricone.

Giuseppe Urrata, Rosario Tinnirello, Eduardo Ciotti, Giovanni Di Stefano, Antonino La Vardera, Antonino Li Causi and Youcef Lounis ended up in prison. Tinnirello has in the past been convicted of mafia, while La Vardera under investigation for the same crime. At the moment, however, the direct direction of Cosa Nostra on the big deal would not have emerged. The investigations, however, continue.

The heart of the investigation, of which few details have emerged so far, concerns trafficking in the Sperone and Brancaccio districts. There is talk of a load of three tons of hashish that Youcef Lounis would have taken care of, followed by the police upon his arrival at the Palermo airport. He traveled through half of Europe and Africa. A ghost with false identities on which the investigations of the policemen have focused.

He was coming to town to negotiate a huge deal. Three thousand kilos of hashish would have to be sunk into the sea and then recovered. The agents were hot on the heels of the elegant businessman. Gray dress, black coat and leather bag. Now his name is part of the list of people reached by a precautionary custody order in prison.

The investigation started in 2019, monitoring a parking lot in the Brancaccio district. In August 2020, a shipment of 105 kilos of hashish was detained. In the course of the investigative activities, the objective of the group was consolidated in this regard. The drug followed the triangulation Morocco, Spain, Italy. Excellent quality with competitive prices.

The trafficker of Algerian origin, a lover of luxury, was tracked down and arrested in the province of Caserta. He was wearing a semi-automatic pistol, Beretta brand, 7.65 caliber, which was found to be stolen.

criminal liability for the facts indicated will be ascertained during the trial and therefore at the
moment all the suspects must be considered innocent until the final sentence.
Palermo, May 18, 2023

it is a method widely used by the mafia in recent times

The octopus gang was a large Dutch criminal organization dedicated to the importation of hashish in the 1990s they already used that method along the coast of Portugal.

yes, the Mexican and Colombian cartels use that method too; in Sicily in recent years it seems that it is also used for cocaine

They maybe using experienced divers at least the Octopus group did.

Nitto Santapaola: 30 years ago the arrest of the ''hunter''
Albert Castiglione May 18, 2023
It was dawn on May 18, 1993 when in a remote farmhouse among the companions of Caltagirone, the head of the Sco Antonio Manganelli and his colleague Alessandro Pansa led the Full Moon operation which put an end to the Catania godfather's inaction. Benedetto Santapaola known as Nitto is certainly one of the mafiosi with the highest criminal standing in the history of Cosa Nostra, one of the bloodiest and most powerful bosses.
Nicknamed "The Hunter" because of his passion for hunting, his criminal history is intertwined with the history of the last 40/50 years of Sicily.
Never any repentance, no collaboration with justice, Santapaola was the symbol of a mafia that dialogues on an equal footing with the institutions. Esteemed and feared, he was the man of a thousand entries into Catania, with the approval of the Corleonesi who held him in high esteem, leaving him freedom of action and movement in his territory.
The climb to the top of Cosa Nostra is rapid for Nitto who, starting from the San Cristoforo district, begins to go through the criminal stages starting with his "boss" Giuseppe Calderone, boss of the Catania mafia, by order of the Corleonesi : it's 1978. On August 13, 1980, Vito Lipari, Mayor of Castelvetrano, is found killed. By chance, a car with four people on board is stopped by a patrol of carabinieri: the travelers are Nitto Santapaola , Francesco Mangione and Rosario Romeo , from Catania, together with Mariano Agate , boss of Mazara del Vallo. In the immediacy of the arrest Santapaola and his traveling companions are not even subjected to the paraffin glove because he himself claims to have been on a hunting trip at a friend's house. Captain Vincenzo Melitohe also goes to Catania to verify the alibis, and on his return the four are released from prison by the pro-tempore magistrate. In 1984, part of the facts was revealed. In subsequent interrogations it would emerge that Santapaola had gone to the province of Trapani to solve problems that the building contractor Gaetano Graci had (the friend whose name had not been mentioned in 1980), who had interests in the Trapani area, on behalf of characters above all suspicion:
«Immediately after the award of the contracts, the first intimidations, threats and warnings began against the workers and technicians of the Graci company; and the matrix - local crime, probably backed by some families in the area - was immediately clear. An extremely explicit invitation, in short, to go and cultivate one's contracts elsewhere. The invitation, on the other hand, had not been accepted, and it was Santapaola himself who intervened to resolve the matter by interceding for the businessman from Catania. All his weight as a mafia boss on the scale: to mediate, convince, and - if necessary - threaten».
On January 5, 1984 Giuseppe Fava , founder journalist of the magazine I Siciliani, is killed in front of the Teatro Stabile in via dello Stadio in Catania. The motive is initially covered by everyone.
The "four horsemen of the mafia apocalypse", as defined by Giuseppe Fava on the historic cover of the first issue of I Siciliani of January 1983, were the knights of work who managed the Catania (and Sicilian) building entrepreneurship at the turn of the seventies. eighty: Mario Rendo , Carmelo Costanzo , Francesco Finocchiaro and Gaetano Graci .
The relationship between the Santapaola clan and the knights emerged thanks to the work of the editorial staff of I Siciliani. The first article only mentions "what appears, what people think and what is probably true": it appears that they are all under investigation for even serious crimes, it is thought that they were the ones who ordered the murder of Carlo Alberto from the Church and there is probably mutual protection but there is no proof.
In the mid-1980s Giovanni Falcone managed to demonstrate his at least indirect interest in the crime of the General from the Church: in fact, the prefect, as soon as he took office, had focused his interest on the business of the Catania entrepreneurs Carmelo Costanzo , Gaetano Graci, Mario Rendo andFrancesco Finocchiaro and on their relationship with Santapaola [19][20].
On the night of December 17, 1993, the "Ursa Maggiore" operation was triggered, which provided for 156 arrest warrants against affiliates and supporters of the Santapaola clan for mafia-type criminal association and a series of other crimes (including several murders, such as that of the journalist Giuseppe Fava and inspector Giovanni Lizzio , and numerous damages for the purpose of extortion, such as the fire of the Standa warehouses in via Etnea in 1990) and was largely based on the statements of the collaborator of justice Claudio Severino Samperi. 53 of the 156 arrest orders hit subjects already detained (including Santapaola himself) and the operation occupied a total of about a thousand carabinieri, police officers and financiers [49].
An important page ended with the capture of this large fugitive but, as always in the history of this country, the true and clear reconstruction of the role of the boss in the dialogue with more or less deviant parts of the state is absolutely vague and uncertain.

Palermo, from Brancaccio to Porta Nuova: 17 arrests for NOMI drugs
Mobile squad operation
THE BLITZ
by Riccardo Lo Verso
MAY 23, 2023, 09:39

PALERMO – From Brancaccio to Porta Nuova drug dealers are in perennial activity. There are 17 people reached by a precautionary custody order carried out by the agents of the Palermo mobile team. Some were already detained and others have surnames known to the judicial chronicles. Like the Marsalones, members of a family that has always been in the drug business , linked to the Porta di Nuova mafia and with solid connections in Santa Maria di Gesù.

In recent operations it had emerged that three districts - Porta Nuova, Tommaso Natale and Brancaccio - have joined together to fill the city with drugs, imported from Calabria and Campania.

https://livesicilia.it/palermo-arresti-droga-mafia-brancaccio/

Agostino trial, Enzo Brusca and the witness of pg Rosario Brocato will be heard
May 26, 2023
Today the last heads of the defense were questioned
The collaborator of justice Enzo Salvatore Brusca and the witness of pg Rosario Brocato will be heard on 16 June, cited pursuant to art.507 in the trial on the double murder of the police officer, Nino Agostino and his wife (pregnant), Ida Castelluccio , killed on August 5, 1989.
The defendants are the Arenella boss Gaetano Scotto , accused of having been the killer together with Antonino Madonia (for which the Attorney General has asked for a life sentence in abbreviated form), and Francesco Paolo Rizzuto , accused of aiding and abetting.
As requested by the Attorney General, Brusca will be heard with respect to what was declared to the investigators on 7 July 2021, with respect to the connection between the murder of the two spouses and the murder of Salvatore Genova (for which Brusca himself was convicted). In particular, Brusca will be asked to answer questions about what the brothers Salvo and Nino Madonia had to tell him . Therefore, Commissioner Rosario Brocato , official police officer of the Dia, will also be heard with respect to further investigative activities carried out in recent months and filed with respect to specific investigations on elements that emerged during the hearing concerning the figure of Giovanni Aiello, also known as “monster face”, deceased. Or again on the capture of Antonino Madonia.