Mafia boss Matteo Messina Denaro, Italy’s most wanted man, arrested in Sicily

Matteo Messina Denaro, one of the bosses of the Cosa Nostra Mafia in Sicily and Italy’s maximum desired guy, has been arrested via way of means of police at the same time as being dealt with in a personal fitness health facility in Palermo, prosecutor Maurizio de Lucia stated Monday.

He were a fugitive in view that 1993 and changed into taken into consideration via way of means of Europol one of the maximum desired guys in Europe, de Lucia advised CNN.

“It is a victory for all of the police forces which have labored collectively over those lengthy years to carry the harmful fugitive to justice,” Italy’s leader of Police, Lamberto Giannini, stated in a announcement congratulating the Carabinieri – Italy’s navy police – and the Palermo Public Prosecutor’s Office.

Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni tweeted: “A outstanding victory for the nation, which demonstrates that it does now no longer surrender withinside the face of the Mafia.”

Defense Minister Guido Crosetto known as the arrest “a signal of a nation that wins towards Mafia.”

Speaking outdoor the prosecutor’s workplace, Meloni stated that at the same time as Italy had now no longer but received the “war” towards the Mafia, this changed into a “war that changed into essential to win.”

“It’s an afternoon we are able to have a good time and inform our youngsters that the Mafia may be defeated,” she stated.

A lifestyles of crime

Messina Denaro is idea to have ordered dozens of Mafia-associated murders, and changed into given numerous lifestyles sentences in absentia for his many crimes, maximum considerably in 1992 for his involvement withinside the separate murders of anti-Mafia prosecutors Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino.

He acquired his maximum current lifestyles sentence in 2020 for deadly bombings in Milan, Florence and Rome withinside the overdue 1990s, and for the homicide and torture of the 11-12 months-vintage son of an enemy who gave proof towards the Sicilian Cosa Nostra.

Having been a desired guy for almost 30 years, he changed into Cosa Notra’s longest-hiding fugitive.

Messina Denaro changed into taken into custody round 10 a.m. neighborhood time after a raid performed via way of means of greater than one hundred specialised dealers with the anti-Mafia Carabinieri withinside the early hours of the morning. The Maddalena health facility wherein he changed into arrested is a personal health facility regarded for plastic surgical procedure and different non-compulsory surgeries. It isn’t always regarded what remedy Messina Denaro changed into receiving.

The Carabinieri press workplace advised CNN on Monday that he’s being held in a “mystery location.”

In current years, anti-Mafia safety forces had been remaining in on Messina Denaro’s circle, seizing round €three billion ($three.25 billion) in belongings belonging to companions, spouse and children and pals idea to be assisting his lifestyles in hiding, and making arrests among 2009 and 2010.

Messina Denaro – referred to as Diabolik – is seemed as one of the successors of Bernardo Provenzano, who changed into arrested at the same time as in hiding in a farmhouse outdoor Corleone, Sicily, in April 2006.

Crime changed into a own circle of relatives affair for Messina Denaro, born to a regarded Mafia boss in Sicily on April 26, 1962. Among the ones arrested withinside the 2009-2010 crackdown changed into his brother, Salvatore Messina Denaro, who refused to testify approximately his whereabouts.

In 2013, his sister, Patrizia Messina Denaro, changed into sentenced to fourteen years in prison, a time period she remains serving, for being a member of the Mafia.

Time in hiding

While in hiding, Messina Denaro maintained numerous romantic relationships, along with together along with his fiancée, Franca Alagna, with whom he had a daughter, Lorenza. Another of his high-profile liaisons changed into with an Austrian motel worker, who bragged that the 2 of them traveled to Greece on holiday regardless of his being on Europol’s maximum-desired list. Over the years, there had been severa failed tries to arrest him.

In May 2011, police believed they have been surveiling Messina Denaro at a farmhouse close to his domestic metropolis of Castelvetrano, however they did not seize him regardless of the involvement of masses of officers. His DNA changed into later determined on the site.

Adding to police embarrassment changed into the arrest of a British guy at a eating place in The Hague in 2021, after the anti-Mafia police wrongfully recognized him as Messina Denaro.

A suspected sighting of him in a vehicle in September that 12 months caused a manhunt and masses of tips, the prosecutor stated.