Italy’s white-collar mafia

How the Italian mafia turned from massacres to stealth operations and political infiltrations.
ROME, Italy — This week, Italy commemorates the cold-blooded murders of two anti-Mafia heroes. Eighteen years ago, Judge Paolo Borsellino was blown to pieces in full daylight when a small Fiat car, loaded with TNT, detonated in front of his mother’s house in [...]

Italy’s restaurants in grips of mafia’s ‘pasta connection’

Rome – Almost a fifth of all restaurants in Rome and Milan have fallen into mafia hands, according to a report published Friday by one of Italy’s main newspapers.
“It is the largest are staurant chain’ in Italy, controlling at least 5,000 establishments, (employing) 16,000 people and with a turnover of more than a billion euros [...]

Another mafia bust in Italy

Italian police busted a Sicilian Mafia drug ring operating in Peru and Colombia, making 13 arrests and seizing 20 kilogrammes (44 pounds) of high-quality cocaine overnight, a statement said Monday.
Among those arrested was the suspected kingpin, Paolo Messina, accused of operating in rare collaboration with the Naples-area crime syndicate the Camorra, the statement said.
Camorra clan [...]

Unlucky Lotto winners coerced by Camorra Mafia

Naples police say local mobsters shook down winners of a €33 million ($40.62 million) lotto, using threats to extort tens of thousands of euros out of some of the 30 winners.
Winners of Italy’s lottery and number-picking lotto games usually stay anonymous.
But Avellino Carabinieri paramilitary commander Giammarco Sottili told reporters a local Camorra organised crime clan [...]

Italy: Top ‘mafia drug baron’ arrested outside Rome

Lucca, 20 May (AKI) – Italian police on Thursday arrested fugitive Neapolitan mafia drug baron Michele Chierchia at a villa near Fiumicino airport outside Rome. The felon was listed among the country’s 100 most dangerous fugitives, and anti-mafia prosecutors in three different regions had issued arrest warrants for him on drug trafficking charges.
Fifty-eight year-old Chierchia [...]

Neapolitan ‘Mafia’ Pizza’s Secret Ingredient: Coffin Wood?

(May 18) — Gourmands have long pondered over what makes a traditional Neapolitan pizza so lip-smackingly tasty. Is it the delicate dough, the locally made mozzarella or tomatoes picked straight from the vine? Or could it be a lesser-known ingredient, like the smashed-up coffins that are apparently fueling Naples’ stone pizza ovens?
Authorities in the southern [...]

Police: Italy mafias run produce markets

Anti-mafia police say they have broken up an unusual alliance of Italy’s three main crime syndicates controlling wholesale produce markets, including price fixing.

Police said they were arresting dozens of suspects Monday, including a suspected mobster who had just disembarked at Naples’ port from a honeymoon cruise.
Gen. Antonio Girone of Italy’s anti-Mafia DIA squad says the [...]

Cocaine Mafia

Vanguard correspondent Christof Putzel travels to southern Italy to investigate how Europe’s growing appetite for cocaine is funding the growth of West African crime syndicates and fueling a turf war with Italy’s largest mafia organization, the Camorra.
Source – current.com

Mafia caught carrying out violent attacks on video

Dramatic video footage released by Italian police shows a group of mafia gangsters carrying out violent attacks on a bowling alley and a games arcade.
In scenes reminiscent of the hit TV series The Sopranos, the six balaclava-clad men showed utter ruthlessness when they shot up and torched the premises near Naples.
Police believe the attacks [...]

Berlusconi provokes outrage over comments on Mafia publicity

Roberto Saviano is a remarkable symbol of hope in the context of Italian organised crime
IT WAS what I can only call a revealing little “Holywood” moment. It happened last autumn on a warm October Saturday, when your correspondent covered a demonstration in the central Piazza del Popolo in Rome in defence of press freedom.
In the [...]

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