In one of the largest mafia trials in decades, a court in Italy has given over 200 defendants sentences totaling more than 2,200 years in prison.
Approximately 400 solicitors defended the convicted during the trial, which started in January 2021 and was held in the southern Italian town of Lamezia Terme in a specially constructed bunker. The trial had 900 witnesses to give testimony at the time.
The accused mob was allegedly connected to one of Europe’s notorious criminal groups, ‘Ndrangheta.
A former senator of Italy was among those sentenced; however, the decisions are still subject to appeal.
The case confirmed the mob’s extensive sway over southern Italy’s politics and society. According to experts, the convictions of white-collar workers, such as politicians, businesspeople, and local officials, demonstrated the extensive influence of organised crime on Italian institutions.
Giancarlo Pittelli, a lawyer and former senator for Forza Italia, the political party of former premier Silvio Berlusconi, was one of the most prominent individuals to receive a sentence. Pittelli was given an 11-year sentence for conspiring with an organisation akin to the mafia.
High-ranking officials, professionals from a variety of industries, and civil servants were among the others found guilty; these individuals were vital to the ‘Ndrangheta’s ability to infiltrate the official economy and state institutions.
After the trial concluded on October 16, a panel of three judges brooded over the fate of the 338 accused and decided on Monday. The court’s decision-making process took an hour and forty minutes.
Over 100 men were found not guilty, while about 207 were put in prison. Three 30-year terms and five life sentences make up the total amount of imprisonment.
42 women were tried, which set a record for a mafia trial in which 39 were found guilty.
According to the testimonies given during the trial, many of the defendants had nicknames like “The Wolf,” “Fatso,” and “Lamb Thigh” that were captured on about 24,000 wiretaps.
According to the sentencing, the convicted include Italy’s former regional councillors Luigi Incarnato and Pietro Giamborino, the former mayor Gianluca Callipo, former police chief Giorgio Naselli, and former financial police officer Michele Marinaro.
The judges during the case hearing were put under police protection over fears for their safety.
‘Ndrangheta, the criminal group that originated in Calabria, is known to have control over 80% of Europe’s cocaine market.
The gang boasts an estimated annual turnover of around $60bn (£49bn).
The trial was carried out in a call centre on the outskirts of the city of Lamezia Terme, Italy. The building turned into a high-security courtroom equipped with coops to hold the defendants and large enough to hold some 600 attorneys and 900 substantiations.
Charges included murder, highway robbery, medicine trafficking, loan sharking, abuse of office, and plutocrat laundering.
During the trial, a demonstration of how the Calabrian syndicate extended its reach across the mainland, ultimately operating as far away as South America and Australia, was mentioned.
The trial, the largest of its kind since the 1980s, saw judges examine thousands of hours of evidence. Former gangsters turned collaborators with the justice system witnessed the conditioning of the Mancuso family and their associates, who apply expansive control over the fiefdom of Vibo Valentia.
Their evidence illuminated the inner workings of one of Italy’s most important mobs. The trial revealed that’ Ndrangheta members allegedly concealed munitions in cemetery sanctuaries, used ambulances for medicine transportation, and diverted public water inventories to grow marijuana.
Those who opposed Italy’s systematised crime group faced grim consequences, including changing dead puppies and scapegoat heads left in front of their houses, burning buses, and vandalising shop windows.
