Blood Brotherhoods (122 page)

The Italian state is also doing a great deal to alienate those citizens who do still manage to live according to the rules. Italy’s criminal justice system is in a lamentable state. The average length of a case is four years and nine months. There are many examples in the story I have told here of mafia-related trials that have dragged on for years, with verdicts being reversed at each successive tier of the system right up to the Supreme Court. These delays are monstrous for the accused, and bring continual discredit down upon the law. The delays can also be made to work in favour of the crooked. Citizens could be forgiven for thinking that the courts offer near-impunity to any white-collar criminal who can afford the lawyers needed to spin out proceedings until the statute of limitations takes effect.

The mafias latch onto the state at its weakest points. Prisons have always been one of the most shambolic parts of the Italian state and for that reason they have always been theatres of mafia activity. Indeed the camorra and the ’ndrangheta were both born behind bars. Since the nineteenth century, detainees in unsafe and overfull conditions have turned to the mafia organisations in the hope of protection, and
mafiosi
have imposed their own arbitrary and brutal rule on their fellow inmates. Italy’s penitentiaries are now more overcrowded than those of any European country other than Serbia. The suicide rate is nearly twenty times higher than it is in Italian society as a whole. No wonder that today, as in the nineteenth century, serving a first stretch is a rite of passage for aspiring gangsters, and most camorra recruits are formally enlisted in jail.

The state can even help push honest citizens into the grey zone. For example, it is utterly failing to impose fairness and transparency on the national economy. A vital case in point is the civil courts, dealing with disputes between citizens and companies, which are in an even worse state than the criminal courts. In 2011, the World Bank ranked Italy 158th out of 183 countries for the efficiency of its justice system in enforcing contracts, just below Pakistan, Madagascar and Kosovo, and three places above Afghanistan. At the end of June 2011, there was a backlog of 5.5 million cases in the civil courts. The
average
length of a case is seven years and three months. In Germany, when a supplier takes a customer to court for an unpaid delivery, it takes him or her an awfully long time to obtain a ruling from a judge—an average of 394 days. In Italy, the figure is 1,210 days. Which is an
age
in the life of a business: one could go bust six times over. No wonder some entrepreneurs are tempted to find less
peaceful ways of recuperating credit.
Mafiosi
welcome such entrepreneurs with open arms and a crocodile smile.

Too much of Italy is dysfunctional. The state apparatus is mired in ineptitude, patronage and corruption. A large slice of the economy is cash-in-hand, and therefore invisible to the law; whole areas of the visible economy are hobbled by inefficiency and sleaze. Italian society seems incurably addicted to the same vices. Nor is there much prospect that Italians will elect a government honest, determined and authoritative enough to implement the reforms their country needs. For as long as Italy remains in this condition, then enduring victory over Cosa Nostra, the camorra and the ’ndrangheta will remain out of reach.

The Cold War gave the mafias a political shield. Behind it, they plundered, prospered, and pushed Italy to the brink of the abyss. But the mafias were around before the Cold War, and they have survived its end. The headline-grabbing violence of the long 1980s may have abated, but organised crime is still a national emergency and a national shame.

However, Italy has more reasons for optimism today than at any point in the past. The anti-mafia magistrates and police forces of Italy are underpaid, underresourced, and understaffed. They operate in very hostile circumstances. Magistrates in mafia-run areas still have constant armed escorts, and live a monastic life for fear that they could be unwittingly photographed in the wrong company. Yet because of the dedication, courage and professionalism that so many of them display, Italy’s gangster fraternities are finding life harder than it has ever been.
Mafiosi
have their meetings bugged. They are tracked down when they flee from justice. Even in the wilds of Aspromonte, the ’ndrangheta is no longer having things entirely its own way. A mountain operations unit of the
Carabinieri
, the
Cacciatori
(‘hunters’) was founded in the early 1990s and equipped with helicopters to combat kidnapping. Since the ’ndrangheta got out of the kidnapping industry, the
Cacciatori
have had notable success in denying Calabrian mobsters full use of their traditional mountain redoubts.

Although the Italian justice system remains extraordinarily lenient and hyper-protective of the rights of the accused, the long history of mafia impunity seems to be over. Gangsters can now expect to be fairly convicted when they go to court. Despite the agonisingly slow workings of the justice system,
mafiosi, camorristi
and
’ndranghetisti
are now serving thousands of years of prison. Just as importantly, billions of Euros of their
stolen wealth have been confiscated. Inroads are even being made into the grey zone.

Looking back from today over the history of Italy’s relationship with the mafias since the Second World War, and indeed since the very origins of the mafias in the nineteenth century, the single biggest and most positive change is that the police and magistracy are, at long, long last, doing their job.

Now it is over to the Italian people to do theirs.

A
CKNOWLEDGEMENTS

LACK OF TIME IS A MAJOR REASON WHY NOBODY HAS EVER BEFORE TRIED TO WRITE A chronicle of organised crime in Italy from its origins to the present day.
Blood Brotherhoods
is the result of a long period of research and writing that it would have been impossible for me to begin, let alone complete, without the support of two institutions. My heartfelt gratitude goes to both the Italian Department, University College London, where my colleagues have created an encouraging and lively environment for teaching and research, and to the Leverhulme Trust, which awarded me a Research Fellowship between 2009 and 2011—a crucial period in the development of the book.

Thanks must also go to my editors and agents who have waited as my submission deadline receded into the distance. My fondest hope for this book is that it constitutes some kind of reward for the saintly patience of Peter Sillem, Rupert Lancaster, Giuseppe Laterza, Haye Koningsfeld, Catherine Clarke and George Lucas. I would also like to thank Kate Miles and Juliet Brightmore at Hodder & Stoughton for their cheerful support. Copy editor Helen Coyle had a much greater influence on the development of the typescript than her official responsibilities imply.

Cosa Nostra, the camorra and the ’ndrangheta show Italy at its worst. Yet the greatest privilege that comes with studying mafia history is that of meeting some of the extraordinary people who dedicate themselves to fighting the mafias, and thereby show Italy at its uplifting best. I would like to thank them for their invaluable help and input of all kinds. The list starts with Nicola Gratteri of the
Direzione distrettuale antimafia
in Reggio Calabria, who impressed me with his courage, energy and rigour—and sent me away laden with fascinating documents. My particular gratitude goes to Michele Prestipino of the
Direzione distrettuale antimafia
in Reggio Calabria: conversations with him have been among the most fascinating moments of my quest to understand and explain the ’ndrangheta. Capitano Giuseppe Lumia of the
Carabinieri
was endlessly resourceful, and colonnello Jacopo Mannucci-Benincasa, head of the Arma’s
Ufficio Criminalità Organizzata
, extremely insightful. In the final stages of writing the book, I was lucky enough to talk at length to Alessandra Cerreti (
Direzione distrettuale antimafia
, Reggio Calabria), Catello Maresca (
Direzione distrettuale antimafia
, Naples), colonnello Claudio Petrozziello and capitano Sergio Gizzi (
Guardia di Finanza
), vice questore Alessandro Tocco and commissario Michele Spina (
Polizia di Stato
), colonnello Pasquale Angelosanto (
Carabinieri
), colonnello Patrizio La Spada, tenente Angelo Zizzi, and the men of the
Squadrone Cacciatori
in Vibo Valentia. My encounters with servants of the rule of law like these were both hugely encouraging as well as extremely useful in confirming or qualifying what I thought about the state of the mafias today. I should stress that they cannot be blamed for any misinterpretation I may have made of their words and that what I have written in these pages reflects my own views.

The many debts I owe to other academics and historians are set out in the notes that follow. But I have also had a number of extremely fruitful personal exchanges with a number of Italy’s leading experts in the field. It is rare to find a historian who is as open-handed with his time and knowledge as Enzo Ciconte. Enzo sent me some documentation I had had trouble finding and scrutinised an important chunk of the manuscript, making valuable suggestions. I discussed some of the ideas in
Blood Brotherhoods
at length with both Marcella Marmo and Gabriella Gribaudi. The book is much better as a result of their consideration and their profound understanding of the camorra. In Palermo, Salvatore Lupo and Nino Blando have always been willing to be mined for interesting ideas.

In
Blood Brotherhoods
I have tried to reach out beyond academia to explain to as broad a readership as possible what we can (and cannot) know about the history of the mafias. From my fellow academics, I can only crave indulgence for sacrificing many conventions of academic writing in this cause. As always, I have called on a team of friends to read drafts of the book in the hope of making it more readable. The following deserve special recognition for their selfless commitment to that arduous endeavour: Nino Blando, David Brown, Stephen Cadywold, Caz Carrick, John Foot, Robert Gordon, Prue James, Laura Mason, Vittorio Mete, Doug Taylor, Federico Varese.

Very many archivists and librarians have assisted me during the course of my work, but some of them were especially kind: Maria Pia Mazzitelli and the staff at the Archivio di Stato di Reggio Calabria, Salvatore Maffei at the marvellous Emeroteca Vincenzo Tucci in Naples, Maresciallo Capo Salerno and Col. Giancarlo Barbonetti at the Carabinieri Archive, Linda Pantano at the Istituto Gramsci in Palermo, and the staff in Humanities 2 at the British Library.

A number of people in Campania helped me during a field trip to many of the places mentioned in this book: Alfonso De Vito, Marcello Anselmo, Egidio Giordano, and Vittorio Passeggio. My friend Fabio Cuzzola was also my go-to guy in Reggio. His generosity extended far beyond the intellectual and even involved his developing an appreciation of Rory Delap’s throw-ins and Ricardo Fuller’s footwork. The great Nino Sapone was invaluable to me in many different ways. He knows his way around the Archivio di Stato di Reggio Calabria like few others, and he has a documented feeling for Aspromonte, its people and history; I will never forget our visits to Amendolea, S. Stefano, Montalto, and the Sanctuary at Polsi. Joseph Condello was an extremely helpful and friendly guide when we toured the Plain of Gioia Tauro together. I would also like to express my thanks to Chiara Caprì, one of the founders of Addiopizzo in Palermo, and to the inspirational Gaetano Saffioti in Palmi for his patience in being interviewed twice.

A long list of people have helped me with advice, or by locating sources; some of them also chipped in with good ideas: I would have been lost without Salvo Bottari, Mark Chu, Vittorio Coco, Nicola Crinniti, Fabio Cuzzola, Azzurra Fibbia, Joe Figliulo, David Forgacs, Patrick McGauley, Francesco Messina, Manuela Patti, Marcello Saija, Nino Sapone, Diego Scarabelli, Fabio Truzzolillo, Chris Wagstaff, Thomas Watkin. Since the very earliest stages of my research into the ’ndrangheta, I have been having exceptionally useful exchanges with Antonio Nicaso. Antonio also read a section of the manuscript, patiently and insightfully. Nick Dines deserves a special mention for his astute and creative research on my behalf. Fabio Truzzolillo not only hunted down some important material for me but contributed positively to the content of the book: I hope by now that he has found the right home for his passion for research. For certain localised but important aspects of my research I relied on the help of David Critchley, Tim Newark, and Eleanor Chiari. Christian De Vito was particularly insightful on the history of the prison system. Roger Parker found out what Silvio Spaventa went to see at the opera. Peter Y. Herchenroether generously sent me the results of his research into early Calabrian
mafiosi
in the United States. Alex Sansom, UCL’s resident expert on early modern Spain, helped me find out more about Cervantes and the Garduña. Jonathan Dunnage was the source of some very useful prompts on the history of policing. My friend and colleague Florian Mussgnug generously surfed the German press on my behalf. A number of people in Australia offered tips on studying Calabrian organised crime in their country. David Brown was remarkably generous in letting me see his collection of material on the same subject: I regret only that I was not able to analyse that area properly in
Blood Brotherhoods
.