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Antimafia Pool
The Antimafia Pool was a group of investigating magistrates at the Prosecuting Office of Palermo (Sicily) who closely worked together sharing information and developing new investigative and prosecutorial strategies against the Sicilian Mafia. An informal pool had been created by Judge Rocco Chinnici in the early 1980s following the example of anti-terrorism judges in Northern Italy in the 1970s.Jamieson, ''The Antimafia'', p. 29 Most important, they assumed collective responsibility for carrying Mafia prosecutions forward: all the members of the pool signed prosecutorial orders to avoid exposing any one of them to particular risk, such as the one that had cost Judge Gaetano Costa his life. Costa had signed the indictments of 55 against the Mafia heroin-trafficking network of the Spatola-Inzerillo-Gambino clan after virtually all of the other prosecutors in his office had declined to do so – a fact that leaked out of the office and eventually cost him his life. He was murdered on ...
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Examining Magistrate
In an inquisitorial system of law, the examining magistrate (also called investigating magistrate, inquisitorial magistrate, or investigating judge) is a judge who carries out pre-trial investigations into allegations of crime and in some cases makes a recommendation for prosecution. The exact role and standing of examining magistrates varies by jurisdiction. Common duties and powers of the examining magistrate include overseeing ongoing criminal investigations, issuing search warrants, authorizing wiretaps, making decisions on pretrial detention, interrogating the accused person, questioning witnesses, examining evidence, as well as compiling a dossier of evidence in preparation for trial. Examining magistrates have an important role in the French judiciary. They are also a feature of the Spanish, Dutch, Belgian and Greek criminal justice systems, although the extent of the examining magistrate's role has generally diminished over time. Since the late 20th and early 21st centurie ...
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Pentito
''Pentito'' (; lit. "repentant"; plural: ''pentiti'') is used colloquially to designate collaborators of justice in Italian criminal procedure terminology who were formerly part of criminal organizations and decided to collaborate with a public prosecutor. The judicial category of ''pentiti'' was originally created in 1970s to combat violence and terrorism during the period of left- and right-wing terrorism known as the Years of Lead. During the 1986–87 Maxi Trial, and after the testimony of Tommaso Buscetta, the term was increasingly applied to former members of organized crime who had abandoned their organization and started helping investigators. Role and benefits In exchange for the information they deliver, ''pentiti'' receive shorter sentences for their crimes, in some cases even freedom. In the Italian judicial system, ''pentiti'' can obtain personal protection, a new name, and some money to start a new life in another place, possibly abroad. This practice is common ...
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Organized Crime Events In Italy
Organizing or organized may refer to: * Organizing (management), a process of coordinating task goals and activities to resources * Community organizing, in which communities come together to act in their shared self-interest * Professional organizing, an industry build around creating organizational systems for individuals and businesses * Union organizing, the process of establishing trade unions ** Organizing Institute, a unit within the Organizing and Field Services Department of the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO) ** Organizing model, a broad conception of organizations such as trade unions * Organizing principle, a core assumption from which everything else by proximity can derive a classification or a value * Organizing vision, a term developed by E. Burton Swanson and Neil Ramiller that defines how a vision is formed, a vision of how to organize structures and processes in regard to an information systems innovation * ...
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Mafia Trials
"Mafia" is an informal term that is used to describe criminal organizations that bear a strong similarity to the original “Mafia”, the Sicilian Mafia and Italian Mafia. The central activity of such an organization would be the arbitration of disputes between criminals as well as the organization and enforcement of illicit agreements between criminals through the use of or threat of violence. Mafias often engage in secondary activities such as gambling, loan sharking, drug-trafficking, prostitution, and fraud. In modern times, the 'Ndrangheta, originating in the Southern Italian region of Calabria, is widely considered the richest and most powerful mafia in the world. The term "mafia" was originally applied only to the Italian Mafia or specifically the original “Mafia”, the Sicilian Mafia, and the term originates in Sicily. However, the term has since expanded to encompass other organizations of similar methods and purpose, e.g., "the Russian Mafia" or "the Japanese Mafi ...
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History Of The Sicilian Mafia
History (derived ) is the systematic study and the documentation of the human activity. The time period of event before the invention of writing systems is considered prehistory. "History" is an umbrella term comprising past events as well as the memory, discovery, collection, organization, presentation, and interpretation of these events. Historians seek knowledge of the past using historical sources such as written documents, oral accounts, art and material artifacts, and ecological markers. History is not complete and still has debatable mysteries. History is also an academic discipline which uses narrative to describe, examine, question, and analyze past events, and investigate their patterns of cause and effect. Historians often debate which narrative best explains an event, as well as the significance of different causes and effects. Historians also debate the nature of history as an end in itself, as well as its usefulness to give perspective on the problems of the p ...
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The Mafia And The Death Of The First Italian Republic
''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the most frequently used word in the English language; studies and analyses of texts have found it to account for seven percent of all printed English-language words. It is derived from gendered articles in Old English which combined in Middle English and now has a single form used with pronouns of any gender. The word can be used with both singular and plural nouns, and with a noun that starts with any letter. This is different from many other languages, which have different forms of the definite article for different genders or numbers. Pronunciation In most dialects, "the" is pronounced as (with the voiced dental fricative followed by a schwa) when followed by a consonant sound, and as (homophone of pronoun ''thee'') when followed by a v ...
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Alexander Stille
Alexander Stille (born 1 January 1957 in New York City) is an American author and journalist. He is the son of Ugo Stille, a well-known Italian journalist and a former editor of Italy's Milan-based Corriere della Sera newspaper. Alexander Stille graduated from Yale and later the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. He has written many articles on the subject of Italy, in particular its politics and the Mafia. His first book, ''Benevolence and Betrayal: Five Italian Jewish Families Under Fascism'', was chosen by the ''Times Literary Supplement'' as one of the best books of 1992 and received the Los Angeles Times book award. In the chapter ''The Rabbi, the Priest and the Aviator: A Story of Rescue in Genoa'' he writes about the life of Massimo Teglio during the war. In 1995 he wrote '' Excellent Cadavers: The Mafia and the Death of the First Italian Republic'', an investigation into the Sicilian Mafia in the latter half of the twentieth century and in particular the e ...
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Salvatore Contorno
Salvatore Contorno (; born 28 May 1946), called Totuccio, is a former member of the Sicilian Mafia who turned into a state witness (''pentito'') against Cosa Nostra in October 1984, following the example of Tommaso Buscetta. He gave detailed accounts of the inner-workings of the Sicilian Mafia. His testimonies were crucial in the Maxi Trial against the Sicilian Mafia in Palermo and the Pizza Connection trial in New York City in the mid 1980s. Early Mafia career Contorno was born in Palermo. His father Antonino had been a mafioso from the later dissolved Corso Calatafimi Mafia family. Salvatore Contorno was a godson of Salvatore "Ciaschiteddu" Greco, who would go on to become the secretary of the Sicilian Mafia Commission. In 1975, the butcher ''Totuccio'' Contorno was initiated in the Santa Maria di Gesù Mafia family in Palermo, then led by Stefano Bontade, an influential member of the Sicilian Mafia Commission and a close ally of Ciaschiteddu. Contorno and Bontade used to be hu ...
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Tommaso Buscetta
Tommaso Buscetta (; 13 July 1928 – 2 April 2000) was an Italian mobster and a member of the Sicilian Mafia. He became one of the first of its members to turn informant and explain the inner workings of the organization. Buscetta participated in criminal activity in Italy, the United States and Brazil before being arrested and extradited from Brazil to Italy. He became disillusioned with the Mafia after the murders of several of his family members, and in 1984, decided to cooperate with the authorities. He provided important testimony at the 1986/87 Maxi Trial, the largest anti-Mafia trial in history. After the murder of the judges Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino, Buscetta gave further testimony to the Antimafia Commission linking Italian politicians to the Mafia. Buscetta entered the Witness Protection Program in the United States, where he remained until his death in 2000. Early life Tommaso Buscetta was born on 13 July 1928, in Palermo, Sicily, the youngest of 17 childr ...
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Maxi Trial
The Maxi Trial ( it, Maxiprocesso) was a criminal trial against the Sicilian Mafia that took place in Palermo, Sicily. The trial lasted from 10 February 1986 (the first day of the Corte d'Assise) to 30 January 1992 (the final day of the Supreme Court of Cassation), and was held in a bunker-style courthouse specially constructed for this purpose inside the walls of the Ucciardone prison. Sicilian prosecutors indicted 475 mafiosi for a multitude of crimes relating to Mafia activities, based primarily on testimonies given as evidence from former Mafia bosses turned informants, known as ''pentiti'', in particular Tommaso Buscetta and Salvatore Contorno. Most were convicted, 338 people, sentenced to a total of 2,665 years, not including life sentences handed to 19 bosses; the convictions were upheld on 30 January 1992 by the Supreme Court of Italy, after the final stage of appeal. The importance of the trial was that the existence of Cosa Nostra was finally judicially confirmed.
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Palermo
Palermo ( , ; scn, Palermu , locally also or ) is a city in southern Italy, the capital (political), capital of both the autonomous area, autonomous region of Sicily and the Metropolitan City of Palermo, the city's surrounding metropolitan province. The city is noted for its history, culture, architecture and gastronomy, playing an important role throughout much of its existence; it is over 2,700 years old. Palermo is in the northwest of the island of Sicily, by the Gulf of Palermo in the Tyrrhenian Sea. The city was founded in 734 BC by the Phoenicians as ("flower"). Palermo then became a possession of Carthage. Two ancient Greeks, Greek ancient Greek colonization, colonies were established, known collectively as ; the Carthaginians used this name on their coins after the 5th centuryBC. As , the town became part of the Roman Republic and Roman Empire, Empire for over a thousand years. From 831 to 1072 the city was under History of Islam in southern Italy, Arab ru ...
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Paolo Borsellino
Paolo Emanuele Borsellino (; scn, Pàulu Borsellino; 19 January 1940 – 19 July 1992) was an Italian judge and prosecuting magistrate. From his office in the Palace of Justice in Palermo, Sicily, he spent most of his professional life trying to overthrow the power of the Sicilian Mafia. After a long and distinguished career, culminating in the Maxi Trial in 1986–1987, on 19 July 1992, Borsellino was killed by a car bomb in Via D'Amelio, near his mother's house in Palermo. Borsellino's life parallels that of his close friend Giovanni Falcone. They both spent their early years in the same neighbourhood in Palermo. Though many of their childhood friends grew up in the Mafia background, both men fought on the other side of the war against crime in Sicily as prosecuting magistrates.Stille, ''Excellent Cadavers'', pp. 22–27 They were both killed in 1992, a few months apart. In recognition of their tireless effort and sacrifice during the anti-mafia trials, they were both awarded ...
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