LAMEZIA TERME, Italy – A trial involving more than 320 defendants began Wednesday in southern Italy against the crime syndicate ‘ndrangheta, arguably the world’s richest criminal organization that quietly gathered power when the Sicilian mafia lost its influence.
The trial is expected to last at least a year and will take place in a purpose-built high-security bunker on the expansive grounds of an industrial park in Calabria, the “toe” of the Italian peninsula.
Prosecutors hope the trial will deal a hard blow to the ‘ndrangheta, the Calabria-based mafia organization that has exploited tens of billions of dollars in cocaine revenue over the decades to expand its criminal reach across Europe and several continents.
Mafia prosecutor Nicola Gratteri told reporters when he arrived at the bunker that the trial, targeting alleged members of a dozen crime clans and local officials, businessmen and politicians allegedly in cahoots with gangsters, marked a turning point. .
“Decades ago, people trembled when they talked about Cosa Nostra or when they used the word ‘ndrangheta, something they only said in a hidden room, around the fireplace, in a whisper,” said Gratteri, who was born in Calabria and remembers how he played and went to school with boys who later grew up to ‘ndranghetisti, as the ranks of the syndicate are known. “Today we are starting to speak out in the open sunlight.”
Heartwarming to him and others in Italy tackling the ‘ndrangheta and other Italian crime syndicates are the growing anomalies of the past, when few ventured to provoke mafia retaliation by reporting attempts to demand’ protection money ‘from large and small businesses and other forms of harassment.
“We’re seeing a spike in complaints from business people, bullied citizens, victims of usury, people who have been under the veil of the ‘ndrangheta for years,” Gratteri said.
Researchers say the ‘ndrangheta has established bases in much of Western, Northern and Central Europe, Australia, North and South America and also operates in Africa.
The first three hours of the opening day of the trial were consumed by the formal roll-call of the defendants and their lawyers. Suspects who are imprisoned for convictions in other cases can follow the proceedings via video conference.
The lawsuit stemmed from an investigation of 12 clans related to a convicted ‘ndrangheta boss. That figure is Luigi Mancuso, who spent 19 years in Italian prison for his role in leading what investigators say is one of the most powerful crime families of the ‘ndrangheta, based in the city of Vibo Valentia.
The Prosecution has indicated that it wishes to call more than 900 witnesses.
Among the charges the court is considering are drug and arms trafficking, extortion and mafia association, a term used in the Italian criminal code for members of organized crime groups. Others are accused of complicity with the ‘ndrangheta without actually being members.
About 325 defendants were ordered to be brought to trial in Lamezia Terme, while about 90 defendants in the investigation opted for an expedited trial, which begins in Calabria later this month. In yet another corollary to the same probe, a trial will begin in February involving five murders elsewhere in Calabria.
The bunker of Lamezia Terme is so large that some twenty video screens are anchored to the ceiling so that the participants can view the progress. There is a sea of tables for 600 lawyers to work on, with microphones and chairs at a safe distance to respect the health rules of COVID-19.
While the numbers are impressive, this week’s trial isn’t Italy’s biggest trial against gangsters.
In 1986 in Palermo, in a similar purpose-built bunker, 475 alleged members of Cosa Nostra, the Sicilian Mafia, were tried, resulting in more than 300 convictions and 19 life sentences. That trial helped reveal many of the brutal methods and murderous strategies of the island’s top Mafia bosses, including sensational murders that bled the Palermo area during years of power struggles.
In contrast, this trial of the ‘ndrangheta convictions of alleged complicity among gangsters and local politicians, government officials, businessmen and members of secret lodges aims to indicate how deeply rooted the syndicate is in the territory.
Based almost entirely on blood ties, the ‘ndrangheta was practically immune to turncoats for decades. But their ranks are starting to get more substantial. Among those turning over the state’s evidence in the Lamezia Terme trial is a relative of Mancuso. Several dozen informants in the case are from the ‘ndrangheta, but others are from the former ranks of Cosa Nostra in Sicily and may be called to testify.
The ‘ndrangheta has been inundated with cocaine-trafficking income and has gobbled up hotels, restaurants, pharmacies, car dealers and other businesses across Italy, especially in Rome and the affluent north, criminal investigations have revealed.
The buying wave of recent years has spread widely across Europe, as the ‘ndrangheta wanted to launder illegal revenues, but also earn’ clean ‘money by running legitimate businesses, including in the tourism and hospitality sectors, researchers said.