Michele Greco
Michele Greco (; 12 May 1924 – 13 February 2008) was a member of the Sicilian Mafia and a convicted murderer. Greco died in prison while serving multiple life sentences. His nickname was ''Il Papa'' ("The Pope") due to his ability to mediate between different Mafia families.Ascesa, omicidi e sconfitte tutti i segreti del "Papa" '''', February 13, 2008 Greco was the head of the . Rise to power Michele Greco was part of the powerful < ...[...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Ciaculli
Ciaculli is an outlying suburb of Palermo, Sicily, Italy. It counts less than 9500 residents. Ciaculli is close to the suburb of Croceverde. Ciaculli has been important within the history of the Cosa Nostra. The best known Mafia family is the Greco Mafia clan The Greco Mafia family () is historically one of the most influential Mafia clans in Sicily and Calabria, from the late 19th century. The extended family ruled both in Ciaculli and Croceverde Giardini, two south-eastern outskirts of Palermo in t .... Ciaculli was the location of the Ciaculli Massacre, in which several police and military officers were killed by a bomb intended for Salvatore Greco "Ciaschiteddu". External linksItalian site on the Ciaculli Agricultural Park Zones of Palermo Greco Mafia clan {{Sicily-geo-stub ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Ciaculli Massacre
The Ciaculli massacre on 30 June 1963 was caused by a car bomb that exploded in Ciaculli, an outlying suburb of Palermo, killing seven police and military officers sent to defuse it after an anonymous phone call. The bomb was intended for Salvatore "Ciaschiteddu" Greco, head of the Sicilian Mafia Commission and the boss of the Ciaculli Mafia family. Mafia boss Pietro Torretta was considered to be the man behind the bomb attack. The Ciaculli massacre was the culmination point of a bloody Mafia war between rival clans in Palermo in the early 1960s—now known as the First Mafia War, a second started in the early 1980s—for the control of the profitable opportunities brought about by rapid urban growth and the illicit heroin trade to North America.Schneider & Schneider, ''Reversible Destiny'', p. 65-66Stille, ''Excellent Cadavers'', p. 103-04 The ferocity of the struggle was unprecedented, reaping 68 victims from 1961 to 1963. Preceding events During the 1950s, the ''Mafia'' had ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Giuseppe Lucchese
Giuseppe Lucchese (; born September 2, 1959), known as ''Occhi di ghiaccio'' (Eyes of ice), is a member of the Sicilian Mafia from the Brancaccio neighbourhood in Palermo. He was one of the favourite hitmen of the Corleonesi, headed by Totò Riina, during the Second Mafia War in 1981–83. Lucchese and Vincenzo Puccio murdered their boss Giuseppe "Pino" Greco in 1985. Puccio replaced Greco and Lucchese became his substitute. After the killing of Puccio on May 11, 1989, Lucchese became the capo mandamento of the Ciaculli-Brancaccio mafia families.Ordinanza di custodia cautelare in carcere , Tribunale di Caltanissetta, Ufficio del giudice per le indagini preliminari, April 11, 1994 Lucchese is suspected of being one of the accomplices in the murders of the mafiosi [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Giuseppe Greco
Giuseppe Greco (; 4 January 1952 – September 1985) was a hitman and high-ranking member of the Sicilian Mafia. A number of sources refer to him exclusively as Pino Greco, although Giuseppe was his Christian name; "Pino" is a frequent abbreviation of the name Giuseppe. One of the most prolific killers in criminal history, he was affiliated to the Ciaculli mafia family, but despite his surname he was not related to the boss of Ciaculli Salvatore "Cicchiteddu" Greco nor to the boss of Croceverde-Giardini Michele Greco. His father was also a Mafioso nicknamed ''Scarpa'' (Italian for "shoe"), hence Giuseppe's nickname of Scarpuzzedda, or "little shoe". Early life He was born in 1952 in Ciaculli, an outlying town in the province of Palermo, administrative center of Sicily. At school he reportedly excelled in Latin and Greek. It is not known precisely when he joined the Mafia but according to pentito Gaspare Mutolo, he started off as a driver for Kalsa boss Tommaso Spadaro, ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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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 ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Salvatore Riina
Salvatore Riina (; 16 November 1930 – 17 November 2017), called (, Totò being the diminutive of Salvatore), was an Italian mobster and chief of the Sicilian Mafia, known for a ruthless murder campaign that reached a peak in the early 1990s with the assassinations of Antimafia Commission prosecutors Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino, resulting in widespread public outcry and a major crackdown by the authorities. He was also known by the nicknames ''la belva'' ("the beast") and ''il capo dei capi'' (Sicilian: '''u capu di 'i capi'', "the boss of bosses"). Riina succeeded Luciano Leggio as head of the Corleonesi criminal organisation in the mid 1970s and achieved dominance through a campaign of violence, which caused police to target his rivals. Riina had been a fugitive since the late 1960s after he was indicted on a murder charge. He was less vulnerable to law enforcement's reaction to his methods, as the policing removed many of the established chiefs who had tra ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Second Mafia War
The Second Mafia War was a period of conflict involving the Sicilian Mafia, mostly taking place from the late 1970s to the early 1990s and involved thousands of homicides. Sometimes referred to as The Great Mafia War or the ''Mattanza'' (Italian for 'Slaughter'), it involved the entire Mafia and radically altered the power balance within the organization. In addition to the violence within the Mafia itself, there was violence against the state, including a campaign of deliberate assassinations of judges, prosecutors, detectives, politicians, activists and other ideological enemies. In turn, the war resulted in a major crackdown against the Mafia, helped by the '' pentiti'', Mafiosi who collaborated with the authorities after losing so many friends and relatives to the fighting. In effect, the conflict helped end the secrecy of the Mafia. Preceding events The instigators of the Second Mafia War were the Corleonesi, the Mafia Family from the town of Corleone, although they were ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Salvatore Inzerillo
Salvatore Inzerillo (; 20 August 1944 – 11 May 1981) was an Italian member of the Sicilian Mafia, also known as Totuccio (a diminutive for Salvatore). He rose to be a powerful boss of Palermo's Passo di Rigano family. A prolific heroin trafficker, he was killed in May 1981 by the Corleonesi of Totò Riina in the Second Mafia War who opposed the established Palermo Mafia families of which Inzerillo was one of the main proponents. Early life Inzerillo was born in Palermo. He married his cousin, Giuseppa Di Maggio, the daughter of his mother's brother, Rosario Di Maggiothe boss of the Passo di Rigano Mafia family.Arlacchi, ''Mafia Business'', pp. 199-200 Through a string of marriages the Inzerillos were related to the Di Maggio and Spatola families in Palermo and the Gambinos in New York.Sterling, ''Octopus'', pp. 199-200. He had two sons, Giuseppe and Giovanni. Inzerillo was a close ally of Stefano Bontade and Gaetano Badalamenti and a relative of the New York City Mafia bos ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Stefano Bontade
Stefano Bontade (23 April 1939 – 23 April 1981) was a powerful member of the Sicilian Mafia. His actual surname was Bontate. He was the boss of the Santa Maria di Gesù Family in Palermo. He was also known as the ''Principe di Villagrazia'' (Prince of Villagrazia) − the area of Palermo he controlled − and ''Il Falco'' (the Falcon).Trent'anni fa l'assassinio di Bontade La Repubblica, April 23, 2011 He had links with several powerful in Sicily, and with prime minister . In 198 ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Corleonesi
The Corleonesi Mafia clan was a faction within the Corleone family of the Sicilian Mafia, formed in the 1970s. Notable leaders included Luciano Leggio, Salvatore Riina, Bernardo Provenzano, and Leoluca Bagarella. Corleonesi affiliates were not restricted to mafiosi of Corleone. During the Second Mafia War in the early 1980s, the Corleonesi clan opposed the faction of the Palermitans represented, among others, by Gaetano Badalamenti, Stefano Bontate and Salvatore Inzerillo. The victory of the Corleonesi, and in particular the rise of Totò Riina, marked a new era in the history of the Sicilian Mafia. Between 1992 and 1993, the Corleonesi initiated a season of attacks against the state, followed by the State-Mafia Pact. History Beginnings In February 1971, the Corleonesi clan's first boss, Luciano Leggio, ordered the kidnapping for extortion of Antonino Caruso, son of the industrialist Giacomo Caruso, and also that of the son of the builder Francesco Vassallo in Palermo. Leggio w ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Gaetano Badalamenti
Gaetano Badalamenti (; 14 September 1923 – 29 April 2004) was a powerful member of the Sicilian Mafia. ''Don Tano'' Badalamenti was the capofamiglia of his hometown Cinisi, Sicily, and headed the Sicilian Mafia Commission in the 1970s. In 1987, he was sentenced in the United States to 45 years in federal prison for being one of the leaders in the so-called " Pizza Connection", a $1.65 billion drug-trafficking ring that used pizzerias as fronts to distribute heroin from 1975 to 1984."Extra Cheese: Busting a pizza connection" ''Time'', 23 April 1984. He was also sentenced in Italy to life imprisonment in 2002, for the 1978 murder of Peppino Impastato
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European Community
The European Economic Community (EEC) was a regional organization created by the Treaty of Rome of 1957,Today the largely rewritten treaty continues in force as the ''Treaty on the functioning of the European Union'', as renamed by the Lisbon Treaty. aiming to foster economic integration among its member states. It was subsequently renamed the European Community (EC) upon becoming integrated into the first pillar of the newly formed European Union in 1993. In the popular language, however, the singular ''European Community'' was sometimes inaccuratelly used in the wider sense of the plural '' European Communities'', in spite of the latter designation covering all the three constituent entities of the first pillar. In 2009, the EC formally ceased to exist and its institutions were directly absorbed by the EU. This made the Union the formal successor institution of the Community. The Community's initial aim was to bring about economic integration, including a common market a ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |