Old and new bosses, the candidate for the elections: who risks conviction
PALERMO – The list of defendants opens with Giuseppe Arduino. He risks 20 years in prison. Released in 2020 after nine years, he would have taken over the reins of the Brancaccio district. The Prosecutor's Office requested the heaviest sentence for him at the end of the prosecution's closing speech by public prosecutor Francesca Mazzocco.
The requests for punishment
These are the other requests for sentences: Alessio Salvo Caruso 10 years (who escaped the ambush in which Giancarlo Romano was killed), Giuseppe Chiarello 10 years, Damiano Corrao 10 years, Sebastiano Giordano 10 years, Antonio Mazzè 6 years, Settimo Turturella 8 years and 8 months, Vincenzo Vella 20 years, Giovanni Iannitello 4 years and 4 months, Giulio Matranga 7 years, Francesco Lombardo 7 years.
“Pact for Votes”
Lombardo was a candidate for the city council in the administrative elections of June 12, 2022 , on the Fratelli d'Italia list. In competition with Vincenzo Vella, of the Corso dei Mille clan, they are accused of political-mafia vote exchange. The request for electoral support was revealed by a Trojan placed on the boss's phone, who had recently been released from prison on a technicality after a 20-year sentence for mafia association.
“Can you get me about twenty votes?” Lombardo said. “You personally, yes,” Vella replied. According to the prosecution, Lombardo, who is a surveyor by profession, knew the criminal depth of Vella, who had already been arrested several times in the past, and would have put his availability on the table: “Haven’t I always made myself available to you guys regardless of politics?”
Vella reassured him: “You’ll take all of ours .” “If I go up there… I’m in the urban planning commission, in urban planning… I’m in private construction, you understand that as soon as there’s a problem here I… and you call me,” Lombardo concluded in front of a fruit and vegetable stall on Corso dei Mille.
The Boss Killed
They were all involved in the blitz coordinated by the deputy prosecutor Marzia Sabella and the substitutes Francesca Mazzocco, Gaspare Spedale and Giacomo Brandini.
Giancarlo Romano, murdered by Camillo Mira, a self-confessed criminal ( he allegedly shot to avoid being killed ) was considered a “rising star of the Brancaccio mandamento”. His name should have been on the list of those arrested, but he was killed before the raid. The day he was killed, he had gone to claim the fee imposed on the Mira family who ran the betting ring. The cameras captured scenes from the Wild West.
The investigation focused on the families of Brancaccio, Roccella-Guarnaschelli and Corso dei Mille. Hotels, machine shops, bars, street food vendors: the pizzo was paid across the board. Once again, as had emerged in the past, silence reigned among economic operators who consider extortion as the lesser evil or, even, a gesture of solidarity. People pay out of fear, but also out of convenience and connivance.
A dozen extortions reconstructed by investigators. There are only three victims who are civil parties: the building contractor Giuseppe Piraino, the owners of the building that houses a hotel and the head of a construction site who received a visit from the men of the racket.
