FALCONE - BORSELLINO PATRONS DE PROMOTION / PROMOTION PATRONS
When the assassinations of Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino took place between the spring and summer of 1992 the history of our Country changed. Their deaths in that year left us with a painful emptiness, robbing us of their presence, their daily sacrifices against crime, their permanent smile even when facing the worst kind of danger. Nevertheless, their sacrifice has not been in vain given that since then we Italians have not been left alone, and it has sown a stronger meaning of the word State in all of us . It has helped to awaken the sleepy souls who thought of the Mafia phenomenon as intangible or non-existent and it has inspired the young men and women to look to the future. Above all, it has instilled in all of us a love for our Country and the will to never give up. Never. Indeed, Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino are without a shadow of a doubt two Italian heroes. However, today, twenty years after those horrible events of ’92, time goes by allowing us not so much as to forget but to spoil their memory through a tired rhetoric or dangerous indifference. Therefore we must hold fast to the facts, the pain, the meaning of their deaths, their dedicated work that has been interrupted but must still be finished. It is in this book “Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino - 20 Years Later” with the beautiful collection of photos by ANSA that we can vividly remember them. This work is not only an important historical record it has also seeds of words and actions which rouse us and remind us of our duties as citizens. Remembering is not something static but a constant stimulus towards tomorrow.
“The war against Mafia – Paolo Borsellino said- must be a cultural movement to make everyone accustomed to the beauty and scent of freedom as opposed to the stench of moral compromise”. Remembering is most of all our civic duty to the victims, to ourselves, to our Country and to the community. And that “sweet scent of freedom” is a moral obligation learned in institutions, at home, at work and above all in the schools which are to educate and train young people and to develop their awareness of being responsible and conscious citizens. And this is where more than anywhere else during these years, the two judges persevered in their civil and civic duty for the good of Italy, boosted by the students’ commitment and enthusiasm throughout the peninsula. “Men come and go but their ideas remain. Their moral tensions remain and will continue to walk on other men’s legs ”, Falcone once said. If we consider the values of democracy, respecting the laws, respecting each other, committing to the community, and if we treasure all of this we can pass it on to the future generations and the hope of our Country will continue to live through our youth. The many martyrs who gave their lives defending human dignity and freedom, among them Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino, are the examples we must look up to and are immortalized in these photos. They are examples not to regret but to emulate in our fight for justice and Good. Everyone, through small daily gestures, are called upon to be servants of the State. Francesco Profumo Minister of Education and of the University of Research.
PREFACE Telling the life story of two judges such as Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino through images that represent, for better or for worse, also the crucial moments of our country’s history. This is the reason behind ANSA’s decision to realize the photographic exhibition “Falcone and Borsellino, Twenty Years Later”: the catchphrase “You haven’t killed them: their ideas will walk on our legs”, written on one of the white sheets hung in Palermo soon after the massacres well sums up the citizens’ rebellion. The photos come from the ANSA archives but also from private family collections and reconstruct the human and professional life of the two antimafia judges who had been tied by a common fate since their postwar childhood in the Magione neighborhood in the historical center of Palermo. The exhibition chapters run through the most outstanding moments of the war against Cosa Nostra: The birth of the antimafia pool; Tommaso Buscetta’s confessions; the maxitrial; the season of ‘poisons’; the controversy on the “antimafia professionals” and the one on the “evidence hidden in a drawer”; Borsellino’s appointment as Head District Attorney in Marsala and Falcone’s as General Director of Penal Affairs in Rome till their tragic assassinations in 1992.
These stories are recalled though the faces of the protagonists, the witnesses and the thousands of people who answered the threats of the mafia by human chains and the rebellion of their conscience . Going through the images you can’t but share what the Head of State said in Palazzo Branciforte in Palermo on May 23rd , 2012 on the occasion of the demonstations for the 20th anniversary of the massacre in Capaci. The photographic tale has a much stronger evocative and emotional power that even surpasses that of words . By means of this initiative ANSA wants to offer the country this immense patrimony which is its photographic archives, being aware that it is also thanks to initiatives like these that we can contribute to the development of our youth’s civic awareness. Luigi Contu Director
FALCONE - BORSELLINO PATRONS DE PROMOTION / PROMOTION PATRONS
CHAPTER ONE
PIAZZA MAGIONE “Since I was a child I’ve always breathed the air of mafia – violence, extortion, killing... I was born in the same neigborhood as many of them. I deeply know the Sicilian soul . I understand much more from the voice intonation, the blink of an eye than from long speeches...” (Giovanni Falcone)
Giovanni, son of Arturo Falcone, head of the Provincial Chemical Lab, and Luisa Bentivegna had two older sisters Anna and Maria. He was a diligent student who attended “Convitto Nazionale” Comprehensive School, one of the strictest schools in Palermo, receiving top marks. He then went on to study at “Umberto I” Secondary School of Classical Studies. He loved the sea and sports, he even trained for rowing competitively.
Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino were born in Palermo at the beginning of the war in Italy; Falcone on May 20th, 1939 and Borsellino on January 19th, 1940. A fate they would seem to share from the time of their birth. Their homes were not far from “Piazza Magione” in a working class neighborhood called the “Kalsa” where buildings were torn apart by the bombings of Allied Forces and then by the speculation of urban expansion.
Paolo, son of Diego Borsellino , a chemist, and Maria Lepanto, is the second of four children: Adele the oldest, younger brother Salvatore, and the youngest Rita. He was light-hearted and a rascal, his family described him as the “little pest”. He also excelled in school where he attended Meli Secondary School of Classical Studies and in June of ‘58 he graduated with high marks in all his subjects above all in Greek. Piazza Magione is the setting where the two future magistrates spent their childhood and adolescence. In the Oratory of Saint Francis of Assisi the boys would play with other neighborhood children they would later on investigate as affiliates with “Cosa Nostra”.
FALCONE - BORSELLINO PATRONS DE PROMOTION / PROMOTION PATRONS
CHAPTER TWO
JUDGES BY CHOICE “I did not like Palermo, that’s why I learnt to love it. Because true love is loving what you don’t like in order to be able to change it...” (Paolo Borsellino) After his high school diploma and a short experience at the Naval Academy in Livorno, Giovanni Falcone entered the Faculty of Law in Palermo where he graduated with honors in 1961 with his final thesis on “Probatory Investigations in Administrative Law”. On June 27th 1962 Paolo Borsellino also graduated with honors in law. In 1963 he passed the State legal exams becoming the youngest judge in Italy. After a short experience in Enna civil courts he is hired as town judge in Mazara del Vallo and later on in Monreale.
Falcone begins his legal career in 1964. His first experience as town judge is in Lentini in the province of Syracuse. Later on he is transferred to Trapani where he would remain for 12 years, carrying out a variety of duties. Such as acting prosecutor, investigative judge, civil court judge, supervisory judge and judge for bankruptcy cases. He would quote this last experience as a useful tool in learning how to read budgets and understanding the banking assessment of money laundering. In 1968 Paolo Borsellino married Agnese Piraino Leto, the daughter of the President of the Court in Palermo They had three children: Lucia, Manfredi and Fiammetta. In 1978 Falcone starts working in the Palermo Judicial Investigative Department headed by Rocco Chinnici: Borsellino is already there. Together they create a core group of judges that will soon generate the first antimafia pool.
FALCONE - BORSELLINO PATRONS DE PROMOTION / PROMOTION PATRONS
CHAPTER THREE
THE BIRTH OF THE ANTIMAFIA POOL “I am neither Robin Hood nor a kamikaze and less than anything a trappist monk. I am simply a servant of the State in terra infidelium...” (Giovanni Falcone) Between 1979 and 1980 Falcone and Borsellino are involved in the first big enquiries on Cosa Nostra. Falcone investigates the Italian-American mafia families: Spatola, Gambino and inzerillo, all involved in drug trafficking and in the pretended kidnapping of Michele Sindona, the bankrupt. In the meantime Borsellino investigates the two brothers Giulio and Andrea Di Carlo, connected with the Corleone boss Leoluca Bagarella. Thanks to the State Prosecutor Rocco Chinnici’s insight, this is the starting point of a new investigative method based on the need to give a unitary and complete picture of the mafia phenomenon. And thus the antimafia pool is born with Falcone, Borsellino, Leonardo Guarnotta, Giuseppe Di Lello and later on Gioacchino Natoli, Giacomo Conte and Ignazio De Francisci.
the political system, challenging the State by killing its judges, policemen, journalists and politicians. Between 1979 and 1982 Mario Francese, a reporter for the Giornale di Sicilia, Boris Giuliano the police chief , judge Cesare Terranova, State Prosecutor Gaetano Costa, President of the Regional Government Piersanti Mattarella, Sicilian Secretary of the Italian Communist Party Pio La Torre, Palermo Prefect Carlo Alberto Dalla Chiesa are assassinated. On July 29th 1983 Rocco Chinnici, the father of the antimafia pool, is killed by a car bomb parked in front of his building. In this act of terrorism two police escorts and the doorman are also killed. Antonino Caponnetto is transferred from Florence and appointed Head of the Investigative Department . He will immediately establish not only a professional but also intense personal relationship with Falcone and Borsellino.
In those years the Mafia doesn’t limit itself just to drug trafficking and extortion; it has taken over construction tenders, polluting both the enterprise and the financial systems, heavily influencing
FALCONE - BORSELLINO PATRONS DE PROMOTION / PROMOTION PATRONS
CHAPTER FOUR
MY NAME IS BUSCETTA “Before Buscetta we had but a superficial idea of the Mafia phenomenon. He confirmed us very much on the structure, the recruitment methods, the functions of Cosa Nostra. But above all he gave us a global picture of the phenomenon, an interpretation key, a language, a code...” (Giovanni Falcone) The investigations by the antimafia pool are characterized by the highly professional accomplishment and the amazing know-how achieved by the Palermo judges. The only thing missing is inside information on the hierarchy and dynamics of Cosa Nostra. Tommaso Buscetta is the first major ‘pentito’(informer) to provide these answers.
year he is then extradited to Italy where he decides to collaborate with Giovanni Falcone, keeping this confidential relationship even after Mafia murders his family (a brother, two children and a former brother in-law). Thanks to Buscetta the judges are able to reconstruct the pyramid system of Cosa Nostra. In the beginning he avoids talking about the connection with the political system. Only after Falcone’s death does he face also the relationship between Mafia and the political system. Buscetta’s confessions would give way to the first investigations leading to the maxitrial. After him other Mafia men, starting with Totuccio Contorno, decide to collaborate with the law.
Born into a very poor family and the last of 17 children, though not having top-level roles, Buscetta was nevertheless able to collect favors from Mafia bosses such as don Paolino Bontade and Gaetano Badalamenti. Fleeing Palermo to escape the Mafia wars unleashed by the Corleone Mafia men overseen by Totò Riina and Bernardo Provenzano, Buscetta is arrested in Brazil on October 24th, 1983. The following
FALCONE - BORSELLINO PATRONS DE PROMOTION / PROMOTION PATRONS
CHAPTER FIVE
THE MAXITRIAL “Mafia is not at all invincible. It is a human phenomenon and as such it has a start, an evolution and therefore an end...” (Giovanni Falcone)
Palermo then the antimafia State Prosecutor; State’s attorneys are Giuseppe Ayala and Domenico Signorino. Among the accused are known Mafia bosses Michele Greco and Luciano Liggio, and the powerful tax collectors Nino and Ignazio Salvo.
Buscetta’s disclosures and the investigations by the antimafia pool lead to the so-called maxitrial. And the Mafia reacts immediately: in the summer of 1985 two of Falcone and Borsellino’s very close collaborators, Deputy Police Chief Ninni Cassarà and Commissioner Beppe Montana are murdered within a few days of one another.
The maxitrial is carried on under tension. The defense would try to block any accusations by using procedure loopholes and even requesting the Presiding Judge’s dismissal. One of the most critical moments of the trial is Tommaso Buscetta’s deposition against Mafia boss Pippo Calò who finds himself at a difficult disadvantage.
The two judges and their families are moved for security reasons to the guesthouse of the Asinara prison in Sardinia where Falcone and Borsellino draw up the decree for an indictment. At the end of their stay they would be given the bill for their living expenses from the State Department.
On December 16th,1987 the sentence is passed and it takes an hour to read it out. The final verdict: 19 life sentences, 360 sentences for a total of 2,665 years in prison and a fine of 11billion and a half Italian Lira or 5,939,254.34 Euro. All of the accusations would be confirmed in the Appeals and Supreme Court.
On February 10th, 1986, in a fortified room built in record time at the Ucciardone prison and known as “bunker courtroom”, the first major trial against Cosa Nostra with 475 accused takes place. Alfonso Giordano is the presiding judge; Pietro Grasso, the secondary judge, would later on become first the District Attorney in
FALCONE - BORSELLINO PATRONS DE PROMOTION / PROMOTION PATRONS
CHAPTER SIX
THE “ANTIMAFIA PROFESSIONALS” “What pushed Sciascia to write that famous article? The antimafia politically was useful, and, consequently, besides those who believed in it there were many people who were riding that tiger for their own individual benefit...” (Paolo Borsellino) A year before the maxitrial sentencing, Paolo Borsellino asked to be appointed State Prosecutor in the town of Marsala, surpassing other judges due to his seniority. This decision is criticized by the Sicilian writer Leonardo Sciascia who writes an article published on January 10th, 1987 for the newspaper “Corriere della Sera” with the following title “The Antimafia Professionals”. This article invites the reader to understand that “Everything is useless, in Sicily if you want to follow a judiciary career all you need is to be a part of a mafia-like trial”.
Borsellino and Sciascia tried to soften the criticism until they cleared up this argument at a convention in Marsala just before the writer’s death. They would agree on one common appraisal: the fight against Mafia is to be led by respecting the laws and by keeping personal career interests aside. In the Marsala District Borsellino led numerous delicate investigations on the Mafia organization in Trapani. He was assisted by a few young substitute Discrict Attorneys like Antonio Ingroia, Massimo Russo, Alessandra Camassa and Diego Cavaliero. Rita Atria, daughter of a mafia boss, provided key information during the investigations with Borsellino and a father-daughter relationship was forged. The young girl killed herself a week after the tragedy of “Via D’ Amelio” due to the pain and distress.
The controversy spreads like wildfire. Some antimafia movements accuse Sciascia of playing the mafia’s hand and they nickname him “quaquaraqua”, the lowest human category described by the writer himself in his book “Il giorno della civetta”. Sciascia emphasizes that his article was turned upside down.
FALCONE - BORSELLINO PATRONS DE PROMOTION / PROMOTION PATRONS
CHAPTER SEVEN
THE COURTHOUSE FULL OF POISON “I soon realized that in a few months Giovanni Falcone would have been destroyed. And what grieved me even more was the fact that professionally he would pass away in silence...” (Paolo Borsellino) The hostility Giovanni Falcone and the antimafia pool perceive from some groups of colleagues soon transfers to the courthouse where the climate is poisoned while waiting for the “changing of the guard” to head the Office of Investigations.
Against the choices made by the Supreme Board of Judges and Meli’s methodology, Borsellino speaks out, quoted in an interview on July 20th, 1988 and published in two national newspapers “Repubblica” and “L’Unita”. He denounces the disintegration of the antimafia pool and launches an alarm. The Supreme Board of Judges counters by opening an investigation on Borsellino which almost turns into a disciplinary act. The last slap in the face for Falcone comes when Domenico Sica is appointed in his place Head of the High Antimafia Commission.
Giovanni Falcone would seem to be the natural successor to Antonino Caponnetto but is overlooked and Antonio Meli is appointed Investigating Counselor in September of 1987. This choice made by the Supreme Board of Judges (CSM), based simply on seniority rather than on Falcone’s extensive experience in the field, raises controversy. The new Head of the Department radically changes the way the group would work: nullifying their unitarian work against Cosa Nostra and dividing up the enquiries. Another blow comes from the Supreme Court, especially the office run by Corrado Carnevale who cancels some of the judges’ innovative sentences.
FALCONE - BORSELLINO PATRONS DE PROMOTION / PROMOTION PATRONS
CHAPTER EIGHT
THE SEASON OF THE CROW “We are against very smart minds trying to control the actions of Mafia. There maybe some connections between the highest ranks of Cosa Nostra and the secret branches of political power...” (Giovanni Falcone) On June 21st,1989 Giovanni Falcone miraculously escapes an attempt on his life at his rented villa on the coast of Addaura. His police escorts notice a diver’s bag with 58 pieces of dynamite hidden in the rocks by the sea where Falcone has his daily swim. At the time he was in the company of two Swiss colleagues, Carla del Ponte and Claudio Lehmann, with whom he was conducting a delicate international enquiry on money laundering.
Immediately after this failed assassination attempt hearsay starts up, even within the walls of the Courthouse, claiming it was Falcone himself to set it all up. In this climate of poison a “black crow” intrudes. This well informed public figure would send a series of anonymous defaming letters and accuse Falcone of helping, together with his antimafia colleagues and police investigators, Totuccio Contorno to take up arms again. The “black crow” accuses Falcone also of covering up Contorno’s bloodthirsty revenge with the aim of bringing out in the open the wanted Mafia bosses of Corleone. Suspicions point immediately at one judge - Alberto Di Pisa – who had already spoken out publicly, even in front of the Supreme Board of Judges, against the antimafia pool’s methods. During a series of analyses on the judge’s fingerprints, later declared unreliable, Di Pisa is dragged through a legal battle ending in his acquittal in the Court of Appeals. A week after the failed assassination attempt the Supreme Board of Judges nominates Falcone as Substitute District Attorney. Even here the magistrate would meet obstacles and resistance.
FALCONE - BORSELLINO PATRONS DE PROMOTION / PROMOTION PATRONS
CHAPTER NINE
THE EVIDENCE IN THE DRAWERS “It is Mafia that imposes its conditions on the politicians and not viceversa. In fact, by definition, Mafia has no interest in general political activity. Cosa Nostra is only interested in its own survival and nothing else...” (Giovanni Falcone) Giovanni Falcone would not only be verbally attacked by those in different judiciary sectors but also by his very antimafia group. The most notorious attack is that of Leoluca Orlando, at the time Mayor of Palermo, who accused the judge in a television interview of “hiding the evidence in the drawers” proving the secret understanding between Mafia and the world of politics. Orlando hints at the accusations made by the “pentito” (informer) Giuseppe Pellegriti at Salvo Lima, head of Andreotti’s political wing in Sicily. But those accusations would undergo an investigative check and turn out to be slander.
Falcone reacts to this attack by marking him as a “cynical politician” and adds: “this is a way of doing politics through a system we refuse”. This dispute extends also to the controversy on the definition, not just lexicon, of the so-called “Third Level”. The most radical components of the antimafia movement identify it in a sort of “political dome” able of addressing the criminal strategies of Cosa Nostra. However Falcone doesn’t believe there is an “Old Man” or “marionette” in the world of politics pulling the strings of the Mafia from above. The breaking up of the antimafia front isolates even more Falcone who loses the election in the Supreme Board of Judges. The bitter disagreements with the Head of the Department Pietro Giammanco convince him to leave his post in Palermo and continue his hard work in Rome.
FALCONE - BORSELLINO PATRONS DE PROMOTION / PROMOTION PATRONS
CHAPTER TEN
FROM PALERMO TO ROME “Laws are useless if they are not supported by a strong and precise political will, if they cannot work because of lack of adequate structures, and above all if the structures are not equipped with professionally qualified men...” (Giovanni Falcone) Already squeezed between environmental hostilities and public attacks, upon Claudio Martelli’s request, Falcone agrees on leading the Department of Penal Affairs of the Ministry of Justice in 1991. His defamers accuse him of having sold himself to politics.
can breath air full of tension: a group of young judges challenges the way the Head of the Department Pietro Giammanco runs the office. The group of “rebels” moves around Borsellino. On January 30th 1992 the Supreme Court confirms the verdict of the maxitrial, making in this way vain all the Mafia bosses’ expectations. The answer comes pretty soon: on March 12th Salvo Lima, political reference point, is killed as being considered unreliable by Cosa Nostra. It is the beginning of the slaughtering season.
In his new job Falcone aims to strengthen the antimafia legislation and improve the investigative tools in the war against Cosa Nostra. From one of his ideas the National Antimafia Department will be born. He is the natural candidate as Head of the Department, a well deserved position thanks to the professional experiences and acquaintances he has acquired over the years, but once again the choice falls upon another judge, Agostino Cordova. On December 11th in the same year Paolo Borsellino leaves Marsala and comes back to Palermo appointed as District Attorney together with the substitute Antonio Ingroia. In the Department you
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CHAPTER ELEVEN
CAPACI AND VIA D’AMELIO “We usually die either because we are alone or because we have joined an extremely dangerous game. In Sicily Mafia hits the State’s servants whom the State was unable to protect...” (Giovanni Falcone) On May 23rd 1992 Giovanni Falcone and his wife Francesca Morvillo come back to Palermo from Rome. At 5.58 p.m. close to the Capaci exit, the procession of armour-plated cars is hit by a terrifying explosion. 500 kilos of trinitrotoluene placed in a canal below the highway set off hell. Three police escorts - Antonino Mortillaro, Rocco Di Cilio and Vito Schifani – are killed immediately. Falcone and his wife, travelling in another car, are seriously injured. They will die soon after in hospital. The assassinations provoke a deep indignation in the Country. Parliament, after being unable for weeks to agree on the election of a new Head of the State, agrees on Oscar Luigi Scalfaro. Falcone’s funerals take place in the Church of San Domenico in a high tension climate. Screams and pushes welcome the politicians.
The Capaci massacre stirs the civilian society and pushes the judges to a strong reaction. The group of the “rebels” of the Palermo District, having clearly broken up with the Head of the Department Pietro Giammanco, ask to be transferred. The name of Borsellino, Falcone’s natural heir, is suggested as ”Superprocuratore” (High Prosecutor). But he turns down the offer in order to carry out his recent work in Palermo, even if he is aware of being Cosa Nostra’s next target. “They will kill me, but it will not be the vengeance of Mafia. Perhaps the ones who will physically kill me will be Mafiosi, but the ones wanting my death will be others...” (Paolo Borsellino) On July 19th, 57 days after the Capaci massacre, a car bomb blows up at 4.58 p.m. in via D’Amelio. Borsellino is torn to pieces while going to his mom’s. Five police escorts die with him: Emanuela Loi, Walter Eddie Corsina, Agostino Catalano, Vincenzo Li Muli and Claudio Traina.
Within the church rises the desperate cry of Rosaria Schifani, one of the police escorts’ young widower, who from the pulpit addresses the ’Men of Mafia’ inviting them to kneel down and ask for forgiveness.
FALCONE - BORSELLINO PATRONS DE PROMOTION / PROMOTION PATRONS
CHAPTER TWELVE
YOU HAVEN’T KILLED THEM “The war against Mafia must be a cultural movement making everybody accustomed to the fragrance and beauty of freedom as opposed to the stench of moral compromise, indifference, contiguity and hence connivance...” (Paolo Borsellino) Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino’s murders provoke not only a stream of disdain in the whole country but also the State’s reaction. The day after via D’Amelio massacre 156 bosses prisoners are moved to Pianosa and Asinara to be subjected to the 41 bis prison system. Also the ‘Sicilian Vespers’ operation is launched: the army is given the task to watch and defend the ‘sensitive goals’. In the meantime Palermo mobilizes. Hundreds of sheets with catchwords expressing a strong collective rebellion hang from the city balconies. A thousand-people march forms a human chain linking the symbolic places of the city , from Falcone tree to the Court.
This is also a way to overcome the judges’ sense of loss that Antonino Caponnetto in a figurative style expressed soon after Paolo Borsellino’s death: “It’s all over….” Grief and bewilderment are substituted by the eagerness to fight. A pool of judges takes up again the interrupted job. But at the same time – as it will be proved only years later – other pieces of the State, thanks to the former mafioso Mayor Vito Ciancimino’s mediation, try to negotiate with Cosa Nostra in order to stop the massacres. “I’d like to tell this city that men pass by, their ideas remain. So do their moral tensions that will keep on walking on other men’s legs...” (Giovanni Falcone) On January 15th 1993, the very day in which the new Public Prosecutor Giancarlo Caselli takes his office, the Carabinieri forces arrest Totò Riina who had been on the run for 24 years. Mafia answers by throwing bombs in Rome, Milan and Florence. Later, under Bernardo Provenzano’s direction, the bosses take up a new strategy: they submerge waiting for the flood to lower. But on April 11th 2006 after being on the run for 43 years also Provenzano is arrested by the police in a country cottage in Corleone. Massacres turn out to be Mafia’s worst business.
FALCONE - BORSELLINO PATRONS DE PROMOTION / PROMOTION PATRONS
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
PALERMO 20 YEARS LATER Twenty years after the massacres in 1992 Palermo is invaded by twenty thousand young people disembarked from the ‘ships of legality’. A colorful and calm stream of boys pours out into the streets and screams: “We fight for our right to change”. The Head of the State Giorgio Napolitano is waiting for them in the bunker courtroom in the Ucciardone prison and encourages them to ‘change the political system and society”. Later on Napolitano will be moved when looking at the photos of the ANSA exhibition telling Falcone and Borsellino’s parallel story. Palermo and Sicily have taken the pride and the strength to change from their sacrifice and their moral lesson. Both the civil society and the antimafia organizations – from Addiopizzo to Libera – have promoted a new culture of legality. The police and judges’ enquiries have broken the collusions and disjointed Cosa Nostra’s structure. With the exception of a few ones, all the big bosses, from Totò Riina to Bernardo Provenzano, have been arrested and condemned after being on the run for years. As it was planned by Pio La Torre in the La Torre-Rognoni law, the attack to the power of the Mafia has invested also the bosses’ patrimony. Among the many confiscated properties, we can remember also Verbumcaudo, the symbolic large landed estate of Michele Greco, the Mafia ‘papa’. The huge wealth piled up by blood and criminal threat has
been brought back into the circuit of legal economy by granting firms and lands to young people’s production and work cooperatives. The enquiries on the massacres went as far as to the grey area of institutional collusions and covering. While Falcone and Borsellino were massacred, parts of the State were entering upon negotiations with the bosses by a wicked agreement aiming to stop the bomb strategy by loosening the repressive pressure in return. Twenty years later inconvenient truths are emerging but the Premier Mario Monti from Palermo sends out a clear message to the judges: ” There is no other reason of State but truth”. Traduzioni di Devon Lynn Shrago ed Eugenia Cannada
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