Italian police have arrested the leader of the Sicilian Cosa Nostra, Messina Denaro. As the Carabinieri announced on Monday, the mafia boss and Italy’s most wanted criminal was arrested in Palermo.
He is considered the supreme godfather of the Cosa Nostra in Sicily and the most wanted mafia boss in Italy: the police arrested the mafioso Messina Denaro on Monday after a long and unsuccessful manhunt. This is reported by the Reuters news agency, citing the Italian investigators.
Messina Denaro has been on the run for three decades. The mafia hunters managed to arrest him in a private clinic in Palermo, where he wanted to be treated. Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni spoke of a “great success for the state, which shows that it has never been defeated by the mafia”.
Denaro is said to be partly responsible for the murders of Italian judges Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino. In 2002 he was convicted of complicity in absentia.
Denaro, nicknamed “U siccu” (The Drought), has been in hiding since 1993. The 60-year-old is the scion of a mafia family and committed his first murder at the age of 18. Since 1992 he has been part of the management team of Cosa Nostra, which operates worldwide. He was considered a confidant of former bosses Bernardo Provenzano and Salvatore “Totò” Riina.
In addition to the Italian police, the American FBI is also looking for Denaro, who is said to be one of the most dangerous drug smugglers on the side. It is not yet known how the investigators found out about the mafia boss.
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