DPA/AFP
Rome
Italian authorities claimed a major victory yesterday against a key money-laundering channel used by the ‘Ndrangheta mafia, as they conducted a nationwide sweep on mob-controlled betting activities.
Police issued 28 arrest warrants to mobsters who were already in jail, placed another 13 under house arrest and seized assets worth around €2bn ($2.2bn), including 1,500 betting shops, 82 gambling websites, 45 companies in Italy and 11 abroad.
Separately, Maltese authorities said six Italians were arraigned and due to be extradited on the basis of European Arrest Warrants issued by Italy, while six Malta-registered companies targeted by the investigations had their assets seized.
“Online betting is certainly the ‘Ndrangheta preferred way to recycle profits from drug [trafficking],” Italy’s top anti-Mafia prosecutor Franco Roberti said in a press conference in Reggio Calabria, as reported by the Ansa news agency.
The ‘Ndrangheta, based in Calabria, is one of the country’s main organised crime groups, along with Sicily’s Cosa Nostra and the Neapolitan Camorra.
In an annual report presented to parliament in February, Roberti described the ‘Ndrangheta as a tightly-run organisation with a global reach and enjoying “an absolute supremacy” on international drug-trafficking.
The crew is believed to have been headed by mobster Mario Gennaro, who made his way up through the mob in the southern region of Calabria from local to regional chief because of the gambling ring’s success.
Interior Minister Angelino Alfano described the sting in Reggio Calabria as “a serious blow to the ‘Ndrangheta”.
In a triumph for anti-mafia hunters, dozens of alleged mobsters linked to the group were detained at the end of last year in and around Milan, Italy’s business capital, on charges of criminal association and extortion.
Police released secretly-filmed footage of men undergoing initiation into “Santa” (holy) membership, whereby promoted mobsters swore allegiance to their new “wise brothers” and took an “oath of poison” under which they vow to kill themselves should they ever betray fellow clan members.
A separate sting in January led to the seizure of a notebook written in a hieroglyphic-style code which detailed the initiation rites and the ‘Ndrangheta’s hierarchical structure from “piciotto” (foot soldier) up to Godfather.
It also detailed the clan’s own mystical account of how its structure and “code of honour” came into being as a result of three knights landing on an island off Sicily after being banished from Spain for avenging the honour of their raped sister.