Stefano Bontade
Encyclopedia
Stefano Bontade was a powerful member of the Sicilian
Mafia
. Some sources spell his surname Bontate. He was the capomafia of the Santa Maria di Gesù Family in Palermo
. He was also known as the Prince of Villagrazia - the area of Palermo he controlled - and Il Falco (The Falcon).
He had links with several powerful politicians, including Giulio Andreotti
. In 1981 he was killed by the rival faction within Cosa Nostra, the Corleonesi
. His death sparked a brutal Mafia War
that left several hundred mafiosi dead.
into a family of Mafiosi. His father and grandfather were both powerful Mafia bosses in the area Villagrazia, Santa Maria di Gesù and Guadagna, which were rural districts before they were absorbed into the city of Palermo in the 1960s. Stefano’s father, Francesco Paolo Bontade
, was one of the most powerful mafiosi on the island and a pallbearer at the funeral of Mafia boss Calogero Vizzini
– one of the most influential Mafia bosses of Sicily after World War II until his death in 1954.
Stefano Bontade and his brother Giovanni Bontade – who would become a lawyer – studied at a Jesuit college. In 1964, at the age of 25, Stefano Bontade became the boss of the Santa Maria di Gesù Mafia Family when his father, Don Paolino Bontade, stepped down because of ill-health (he suffered from diabetes). The Mafia went through difficult times at that moment. A bloody internal struggle (known as the First Mafia War) culminated in the Ciaculli Massacre
in June 1963 that killed seven police and military officers sent to defuse a bomb in an abandoned Alfa Romeo Giulietta after an anonymous phone call.
The Ciaculli Massacre
changed the Mafia war into a war against the Mafia. It prompted the first concerted anti-mafia efforts by the state in post-war Italy. Within a period of ten weeks 1,200 mafiosi were arrested, many of whom would be kept out of circulation for five or six years. The Sicilian Mafia Commission
was dissolved and those mafiosi who had escaped arrest went into exile abroad or had to hide out in Italy. In 1968, 114 went to trial, though only ten minor figures would be convicted of anything.
After the killing of Pietro Scaglione
– Chief Prosecutor of Palermo – on May 5, 1971, the police rounded up the known Mafia bosses. Bontade was arrested in 1972 and he was sentenced to three years in the second Trial of the 114 in July 1974, but the sentence was annulled in appeal. Nevertheless, Bontade was sent in banishment to Qualiano
(in the province of Naples
). The policy of banishing mafiosi to other areas in Italy backfired, because they were able to establish contacts outside the island as well. Bontade, for instance, linked up with Giuseppe Sciorio of the Maisto-clan of the Camorra
, who would be initiated in Cosa Nostra.
) and Palermo who had been running this activity since the 1950s. For instance, a thriving smuggler such as Nunzio La Mattina, was initiated into the Santa Maria di Gesù Family.
It was only through cigarette smuggling and subsequently heroin trafficking that many mafiosi were able to survive the difficult period after the Ciaculli Massacre
. But then they started to accumulate large amounts of money rapidly. According to pentito Antonio Calderone, Bontade used to say that fortunately Tommaso Spadaro did a little bit of cigarette smuggling and gave him part of the profits, "because they were starving to death." (Spadaro was related to Bontade, being a godfather to one of his children.)
Bontade was closely linked to the Spatola-Inzerillo-Gambino network. This network and other Sicilian suppliers dominated heroin trafficking since the mid-1970s until the mid-1980s when US and Italian law enforcement were able to significantly reduce the heroin supply of the Sicilian Mafia (the so-called Pizza Connection
). The Bontade-Spatola-Inzerillo traffickers supplied the Gambino
Family – through John Gambino
– in New York with heroin that was refined in laboratories on the island from Turkish morphine base. According to Giovanni Falcone
, the investigating magistrate, the group had made about US$600 million. The proceeds were re-invested in real estate. Rosario Spatola, who in his youth peddled watered milk in the streets of Palermo
, became Palermo’s largest building contractor and biggest taxpayer of Sicily.
The pentito
Francesco Marino Mannoia
, who belonged to the Santa Maria di Gesù Family and who was highly sought after by all Mafia families for his skills in chemistry, recalled having refined at least 1000 kilograms of heroin for Bontade. Marino Mannoia, who had been close to Bontade, decided to cooperate with the Italian state in October 1989, after his brother was killed by the Corleonesi
(and subsequently saw his mother, his sister and his aunt killed as well). According to Marino Mannoia the Sicilian-born banker Michele Sindona
laundered the proceeds of heroin trafficking for the Bontade-Spatola-Inzerillo-Gambino network.
, the president of Italy's state-owned oil and gas conglomerate ENI
. Mattei was killed in 1962 at the request of the American Cosa Nostra because his oil policies had damaged important American interests in the Middle East. The American Mafia in turn was possibly doing a favour to the large oil companies. Buscetta claimed that the killing was organized by Bontade, Salvatore Greco "Ciaschiteddu", and Giuseppe Di Cristina
on the request of Angelo Bruno
, a Sicilian born Mafia boss from Philadelphia.
Buscetta also claimed that the journalist Mauro De Mauro
was killed in September 1970 on the orders of Bontade because of his investigations into the death of Mattei. Buscetta said that Bontade organized the kidnap, because De Mauro’s investigations into the death of Mattei came very close to the Mafia, and Bontate’s own role in the affair. Other pentiti said that De Mauro was kidnapped by Emanuele D'Agostino, a mafioso from Bontade’s Santa Maria di Gesù Family. De Mauro’s body has never been found. Marino Mannoia testified that he had been ordered by Bontade in 1977 or 1978 to dig up several bodies, including De Mauro’s, and dissolve them in acid.
, controlled the Vatican
foreign investments and was a major sponsor of the Christian Democrat party (DC – Democrazia Cristiana), according to a 1982 parliamentary inquiry. The inquiry also pointed out Sindona’s relationship with Giulio Andreotti
– who served as the prime minister of Italy
seven times – and who once defined Sindona as the 'rescuer of the lira'.
After Sindona’s banks went bankrupt in 1974, Sindona fled to the US. In July 1979, Sindona ordered the murder of Giorgio Ambrosoli
, a lawyer appointed to liquidate his failed Banca Privata Italiana. At the same time the Mafia killed police superintendent Boris Giuliano
who was investigating the Mafia’s heroin trafficking and had contacted Ambrosoli just two weeks before to compare investigations.
While under indictment in the US, Sindona staged a bogus kidnapping in August 1979 to conceal a mysterious 11-week trip to Sicily before his scheduled fraud trial. Bontade’s brother in law Giacomo Vitale (a freemason, like Bontade) was one of the persons who organised Sindona’s travel. The real purpose of the kidnapping was to issue sparsely disguised blackmail notes to Sindona’s past political allies – among them Prime Minister Giulio Andreotti
– to engineer the rescue of his banks and recuperate Cosa Nostra’s money. The plot failed and after his “release” Sindona surrendered to the FBI.
The Sindona-affair showed the close links between the Mafia and certain important business men, freemasons and politicians. In the aftermath of the investigations it appeared that many of them were connected through the secret P2 lodge (Propaganda Due
) of Licio Gelli
.
and Ignazio Salvo, two wealthy mafia-cousins from Salemi
who acted as the tax collectors on the island (tax collection was contracted out by the government). Through them Bontade had access to Giulio Andreotti
. Italy’s highest court, the Court of Cassation, ruled in October 2004 that Andreotti had "friendly and even direct ties" with top men in the so-called moderate wing of Cosa Nostra, Stefano Bontade and Gaetano Badalamenti
, favoured by the connection between them and Salvo Lima.
According to pentito Francesco Marino Mannoia
, Andreotti contacted Bontade to try to prevent the Mafia from killing DC-politician Piersanti Mattarella
. Mattarella became the President of the autonomous Sicilian Region in 1978 and wanted to clean up the government’s public contracts racket that benefitted Cosa Nostra. Bontade and other mafiosi felt betrayed by Mattarella (his father Bernardo Mattarella
was rumored to be associated with the Mafia, but all accusations against him were not proven before any court of law).
Andreotti’s attempt failed. After the murder of Mattarella on January 6, 1980, Andreotti again contacted Bontade to try to straighten things out. However, according to Marino Mannoia, Bontade told Andreotti: "we are in charge in Sicily, and unless you want the whole DC canceled out, you do as we say."
Stefano Bontade was also in touch with Silvio Berlusconi
in the mid-1970s, when Berlusconi still was just a wealthy real estate developer and started his private television empire (Berlusconi became prime minister in 1994, 2001–2006, and again from 2008). Bontade visited Berlusconi's villa in Arcore on the outskirts of Milan
, according to Antonino Giuffrè
, a mafioso who was a key aide to Mafia kingpin Bernardo Provenzano
but turned state witness after his arrest in April 2002. Bontade’s contact at Arcore was the late Vittorio Mangano
, a convicted mafioso who used to be a stable manager there. "When Vittorio Mangano got the job in the Arcore villa, Stefano Bontade and some of his close aides used to meet Berlusconi using visits to Mangano as an excuse," Giuffrè said. Berlusconi's lawyer dismissed Giuffrè's testimony as "false" and an attempt to discredit the Prime Minister and his party.
was revived. It consisted of ten members but would initially be ruled by a triumvirate consisting of Gaetano Badalamenti
, Stefano Bontade and the Corleonesi
boss Luciano Leggio
, although it was Salvatore Riina
who actually would represent the Corleonesi. At the time Bontade was emerging as one of the Sicilian Mafia’s acknowledged leaders. Young, rich, personable, intelligent and judicious, as well as the son of a renowned Mafia boss, it all made Bontade an undisputed candidate to sit on the Sicilian Mafia Commission
. In 1975 the full Commission was reconstituted under the leadership of Badalamenti.
The Mafia Commission was meant to settle disputes and keep the peace, but Leggio and his stand-in and successor, Salvatore Riina
, were plotting to decimate the Palermo clans, including Bontade and Bontade's ally, Salvatore Inzerillo
. At the close of 1978, the leadership of the Sicilian Mafia changed. Gaetano Badalamenti, was expelled from the Commission and Michele Greco
replaced him. This marked the end of a period of relative peace and signified a major change in the Mafia itself. Greco was actually allied with Salvatore Riina, and he subsequently used his position to lure many more of Bontade's friends to their deaths in the subsequent Mafia War. Historically, the Greco clan was at odds with Bontate.
The Second Mafia War
raged from 1981 to 1983. In fact, two wars were being waged simultaneously by the Corleonesi
clan. Riina had secretly formed an alliance of mafiosi in different families, cutting across clan divisions, in defiance of the rules concerning loyalty in Cosa Nostra. This secretive inter-family group would become known as the Corleonesi. The Corleonesi slaughtered the ruling families of the Palermo Mafia to take control of the organisation while waging a parallel war against Italian authorities and law enforcement to intimidate and prevent effective investigations and prosecutions.
The Corleonesi initiated the war against the coalition led by Bontade and Badalamenti to try to control heroin trafficking. Despite the larger economic means and the wider international network, the Bontade-Spatola-Inzerillo-Badalamenti network was unable to withstand the ruthless violence of the Corleonesi. The most important members of the Inzerillo, Spatola and Gambino clans were arrested in March 1980 for heroin trafficking, which undermined Bontade’s position significantly.
On April 23, 1981, whilst driving home from his 42nd birthday party, Bontade was machine gunned to death in his car, a Giulietta 2000
, in Palermo. The slaying was carried out by Riina's favourite hitman Pino Greco also known as the "little old shoe" (scarpuzzedda) – a nephew of Michele Greco. Bontade’s close ally, Salvatore Inzerillo
, was killed three weeks later with the same Kalashnikov
.
Many of Bontade's friends, fellow mafiosi and relatives were cut down in the following months to prevent them from avenging the death of their boss. One of Bontade's close friends was Tommaso Buscetta
, who subsequently became a pentito
(collaborating witness) after he was arrested in Brazil in 1983. Salvatore Contorno
, one of Bontade’s trusted aides, followed Buscetta’s example. They were the key witnesses that enabled prosecuting magistrates Giovanni Falcone
and Paolo Borsellino
and the Antimafia pool to successfully prosecute the Mafia in the Maxi Trial
in the mid 1980s.
Sicily
Sicily is a region of Italy, and is the largest island in the Mediterranean Sea. Along with the surrounding minor islands, it constitutes an autonomous region of Italy, the Regione Autonoma Siciliana Sicily has a rich and unique culture, especially with regard to the arts, music, literature,...
Mafia
Mafia
The Mafia is a criminal syndicate that emerged in the mid-nineteenth century in Sicily, Italy. It is a loose association of criminal groups that share a common organizational structure and code of conduct, and whose common enterprise is protection racketeering...
. Some sources spell his surname Bontate. He was the capomafia of the Santa Maria di Gesù Family in Palermo
Palermo
Palermo is a city in Southern Italy, the capital of both the autonomous region of Sicily and the Province of Palermo. 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...
. He was also known as the Prince of Villagrazia - the area of Palermo he controlled - and Il Falco (The Falcon).
He had links with several powerful politicians, including Giulio Andreotti
Giulio Andreotti
Giulio Andreotti is an Italian politician of the now dissolved centrist Christian Democracy party. He served as the 42nd Prime Minister of Italy from 1972 to 1973, from 1976 to 1979 and from 1989 to 1992. He also served as Minister of the Interior , Defense Minister and Foreign Minister and he...
. In 1981 he was killed by the rival faction within Cosa Nostra, the Corleonesi
Corleonesi
The Corleonesi is the name given to a faction within the Sicilian Mafia that dominated Cosa Nostra in the 1980s and the 1990s. It was called the Corleonesi because its most important leaders came from the town of Corleone, first Luciano Leggio and later Totò Riina, Bernardo Provenzano and Leoluca...
. His death sparked a brutal Mafia War
Second Mafia War
The Second Mafia War was a conflict within the Sicilian Mafia, mostly taking place in the early 1980s. As with any criminal organization, the history of the Sicilian Mafia is replete with conflicts and power struggles, and the violence that results from them, but these are generally localised and...
that left several hundred mafiosi dead.
Early career
Bontade was born in PalermoPalermo
Palermo is a city in Southern Italy, the capital of both the autonomous region of Sicily and the Province of Palermo. 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...
into a family of Mafiosi. His father and grandfather were both powerful Mafia bosses in the area Villagrazia, Santa Maria di Gesù and Guadagna, which were rural districts before they were absorbed into the city of Palermo in the 1960s. Stefano’s father, Francesco Paolo Bontade
Francesco Paolo Bontade
Francesco Paolo Bontade , also known as Don Paolino Bonta, was a legendary and powerful member of the Sicilan Mafia. Some sources spell his surname Bontate. He hailed from Villagrazia, a rural village before it was absorbed into the city of Palermo in the 1960s...
, was one of the most powerful mafiosi on the island and a pallbearer at the funeral of Mafia boss Calogero Vizzini
Calogero Vizzini
Calogero Don Calò Vizzini was a historical Mafia boss of Villalba in the Province of Caltanissetta, Sicily. Vizzini was considered to be one of the most influential and legendary Mafia bosses of Sicily after World War II until his death in 1954...
– one of the most influential Mafia bosses of Sicily after World War II until his death in 1954.
Stefano Bontade and his brother Giovanni Bontade – who would become a lawyer – studied at a Jesuit college. In 1964, at the age of 25, Stefano Bontade became the boss of the Santa Maria di Gesù Mafia Family when his father, Don Paolino Bontade, stepped down because of ill-health (he suffered from diabetes). The Mafia went through difficult times at that moment. A bloody internal struggle (known as the First Mafia War) culminated in the Ciaculli Massacre
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...
in June 1963 that killed seven police and military officers sent to defuse a bomb in an abandoned Alfa Romeo Giulietta after an anonymous phone call.
The Ciaculli Massacre
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...
changed the Mafia war into a war against the Mafia. It prompted the first concerted anti-mafia efforts by the state in post-war Italy. Within a period of ten weeks 1,200 mafiosi were arrested, many of whom would be kept out of circulation for five or six years. The Sicilian Mafia Commission
Sicilian Mafia Commission
The Sicilian Mafia Commission, known as Commissione or Cupola, is a body of leading Mafia members to decide on important questions concerning the actions of, and settling disputes within the Sicilian Mafia or Cosa Nostra...
was dissolved and those mafiosi who had escaped arrest went into exile abroad or had to hide out in Italy. In 1968, 114 went to trial, though only ten minor figures would be convicted of anything.
After the killing of Pietro Scaglione
Pietro Scaglione
Pietro Scaglione was an Italian magistrate and Chief Prosecutor of Palermo . He was killed by the Mafia in 1971.-Fighting the Mafia:...
– Chief Prosecutor of Palermo – on May 5, 1971, the police rounded up the known Mafia bosses. Bontade was arrested in 1972 and he was sentenced to three years in the second Trial of the 114 in July 1974, but the sentence was annulled in appeal. Nevertheless, Bontade was sent in banishment to Qualiano
Qualiano
Qualiano is a comune in the Province of Naples in the Italian region Campania, located about 13 km northwest of Naples. As of 31 December 2004, it had a population of 25,452 and an area of 7.3 km²....
(in the province of Naples
Province of Naples
The Province of Naples is a province in the Campania region of Italy. Its capital city is Naples, within the province there are 92 Comuni of the Province of Naples.-Demographics:...
). The policy of banishing mafiosi to other areas in Italy backfired, because they were able to establish contacts outside the island as well. Bontade, for instance, linked up with Giuseppe Sciorio of the Maisto-clan of the Camorra
Camorra
The Camorra is a Mafia-type criminal organization, or secret society, originating in the region of Campania and its capital Naples in Italy. It is one of the oldest and largest criminal organizations in Italy, dating to the 18th century.-Background:...
, who would be initiated in Cosa Nostra.
Cigarette smuggling and heroin trafficking
Bontade and other banished mafiosi managed to get into the market of international cigarette smuggling by imposing first their protection, and later their involvement, upon the smugglers in Naples (who were connected with the CamorraCamorra
The Camorra is a Mafia-type criminal organization, or secret society, originating in the region of Campania and its capital Naples in Italy. It is one of the oldest and largest criminal organizations in Italy, dating to the 18th century.-Background:...
) and Palermo who had been running this activity since the 1950s. For instance, a thriving smuggler such as Nunzio La Mattina, was initiated into the Santa Maria di Gesù Family.
It was only through cigarette smuggling and subsequently heroin trafficking that many mafiosi were able to survive the difficult period after the Ciaculli Massacre
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...
. But then they started to accumulate large amounts of money rapidly. According to pentito Antonio Calderone, Bontade used to say that fortunately Tommaso Spadaro did a little bit of cigarette smuggling and gave him part of the profits, "because they were starving to death." (Spadaro was related to Bontade, being a godfather to one of his children.)
Bontade was closely linked to the Spatola-Inzerillo-Gambino network. This network and other Sicilian suppliers dominated heroin trafficking since the mid-1970s until the mid-1980s when US and Italian law enforcement were able to significantly reduce the heroin supply of the Sicilian Mafia (the so-called Pizza Connection
Pizza Connection Trial
The Pizza Connection Trial was one of the longest criminal jury trials on record in the district of Manhattan. It took place between October 24, 1985 and March 2, 1987-Scope of the trial:...
). The Bontade-Spatola-Inzerillo traffickers supplied the Gambino
Gambino
Gambino is an Italian surname. Notable persons with that surname include:*Carlo Gambino, New York mobster and former boss of the family that takes his name; Gambino crime family*Emanuel Gambino, New York mobster and nephew of Carlo Gambino...
Family – through John Gambino
John Gambino
John Gambino , is an American mobster. He became a made member of the Gambino crime family in 1975 and a capodecina or captain, and head of the crime family's Sicilian faction, appointed by family boss John Gotti in 1986, according to Mafia turncoat Sammy Gravano.-Transatlantic Mafia clan:Together...
– in New York with heroin that was refined in laboratories on the island from Turkish morphine base. According to Giovanni Falcone
Giovanni Falcone
Giovanni Falcone was an Sicilian/Italian prosecuting magistrate born in Palermo, Sicily. From his office in the Palace of Justice in Palermo, he spent most of his professional life trying to overthrow the power of the Mafia in Sicily...
, the investigating magistrate, the group had made about US$600 million. The proceeds were re-invested in real estate. Rosario Spatola, who in his youth peddled watered milk in the streets of Palermo
Palermo
Palermo is a city in Southern Italy, the capital of both the autonomous region of Sicily and the Province of Palermo. 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...
, became Palermo’s largest building contractor and biggest taxpayer of Sicily.
The pentito
Pentito
Pentito designates people in Italy who, formerly part of criminal or terrorist organizations, following their arrests decide to "repent" and collaborate with the judicial system to help investigations...
Francesco Marino Mannoia
Francesco Marino Mannoia
Francesco Marino Mannoia is a former member of the Sicilian Mafia who became a pentito in 1989. His nickname was Mozzarella. He is considered to be one of the most reliable government witnesses against the Mafia...
, who belonged to the Santa Maria di Gesù Family and who was highly sought after by all Mafia families for his skills in chemistry, recalled having refined at least 1000 kilograms of heroin for Bontade. Marino Mannoia, who had been close to Bontade, decided to cooperate with the Italian state in October 1989, after his brother was killed by the Corleonesi
Corleonesi
The Corleonesi is the name given to a faction within the Sicilian Mafia that dominated Cosa Nostra in the 1980s and the 1990s. It was called the Corleonesi because its most important leaders came from the town of Corleone, first Luciano Leggio and later Totò Riina, Bernardo Provenzano and Leoluca...
(and subsequently saw his mother, his sister and his aunt killed as well). According to Marino Mannoia the Sicilian-born banker Michele Sindona
Michele Sindona
Michele Sindona was an Italian banker and convicted felon. Known in banking circles as "The Shark", Sindona was a member of Propaganda Due , a secret lodge of Italian Freemasonry, and had clear connections to the Mafia...
laundered the proceeds of heroin trafficking for the Bontade-Spatola-Inzerillo-Gambino network.
The Mattei affair
In May 1994 Mafia turncoat Buscetta declared that Bontade had been involved in the murder of Enrico MatteiEnrico Mattei
Enrico Mattei was an Italian public administrator. After World War II he was given the task of dismantling the Italian Petroleum Agency Agip, a state enterprise established by the Fascist regime. Instead Mattei enlarged and reorganized it into the National Fuel Trust Ente Nazionale Idrocarburi...
, the president of Italy's state-owned oil and gas conglomerate ENI
Eni
Eni S.p.A. is an Italian multinational oil and gas company, present in 70 countries, and currently Italy's largest industrial company with a market capitalization of 87.7 billion euros , as of July 24, 2008...
. Mattei was killed in 1962 at the request of the American Cosa Nostra because his oil policies had damaged important American interests in the Middle East. The American Mafia in turn was possibly doing a favour to the large oil companies. Buscetta claimed that the killing was organized by Bontade, Salvatore Greco "Ciaschiteddu", and Giuseppe Di Cristina
Giuseppe Di Cristina
Giuseppe Di Cristina was a powerful mafioso from Riesi in the province of Caltanissetta, Sicily, southern Italy...
on the request of Angelo Bruno
Angelo Bruno
Angelo "The Gentle Don" Bruno was a Sicilian-American mobster who ran the Philadelphia crime family for two decades. Bruno gained his nickname and reputation due to his preference for conciliation over violence.-Early years:Born in Villalba, Sicily, Bruno emigrated to the United States in his...
, a Sicilian born Mafia boss from Philadelphia.
Buscetta also claimed that the journalist Mauro De Mauro
Mauro De Mauro
Mauro De Mauro was an Italian journalist. He disappeared in September 1970 and his body has not yet been found. His disappearance and probable death remains one of the unsolved mysteries in Italian history.Several explanations for his disappearance are current...
was killed in September 1970 on the orders of Bontade because of his investigations into the death of Mattei. Buscetta said that Bontade organized the kidnap, because De Mauro’s investigations into the death of Mattei came very close to the Mafia, and Bontate’s own role in the affair. Other pentiti said that De Mauro was kidnapped by Emanuele D'Agostino, a mafioso from Bontade’s Santa Maria di Gesù Family. De Mauro’s body has never been found. Marino Mannoia testified that he had been ordered by Bontade in 1977 or 1978 to dig up several bodies, including De Mauro’s, and dissolve them in acid.
Sindona’s bogus kidnapping
Sindona was in charge of one of the biggest banks in the United States, the Franklin National BankFranklin National Bank
Franklin National Bank, based in Franklin Square in Long Island, New York was once the United States' 20th largest bank. On October 8, 1974, it collapsed in obscure circumstances, involving Michele Sindona, renowned Mafia-banker and member of the irregular freemasonic lodge, Propaganda Due...
, controlled the Vatican
Holy See
The Holy See is the episcopal jurisdiction of the Catholic Church in Rome, in which its Bishop is commonly known as the Pope. It is the preeminent episcopal see of the Catholic Church, forming the central government of the Church. As such, diplomatically, and in other spheres the Holy See acts and...
foreign investments and was a major sponsor of the Christian Democrat party (DC – Democrazia Cristiana), according to a 1982 parliamentary inquiry. The inquiry also pointed out Sindona’s relationship with Giulio Andreotti
Giulio Andreotti
Giulio Andreotti is an Italian politician of the now dissolved centrist Christian Democracy party. He served as the 42nd Prime Minister of Italy from 1972 to 1973, from 1976 to 1979 and from 1989 to 1992. He also served as Minister of the Interior , Defense Minister and Foreign Minister and he...
– who served as the prime minister of Italy
Prime minister of Italy
The Prime Minister of Italy is the head of government of the Italian Republic...
seven times – and who once defined Sindona as the 'rescuer of the lira'.
After Sindona’s banks went bankrupt in 1974, Sindona fled to the US. In July 1979, Sindona ordered the murder of Giorgio Ambrosoli
Giorgio Ambrosoli
Giorgio Ambrosoli was an Italian lawyer who was killed while investigating the malpractice of banker Michele Sindona.-Liquidating Sindona’s financial empire:...
, a lawyer appointed to liquidate his failed Banca Privata Italiana. At the same time the Mafia killed police superintendent Boris Giuliano
Boris Giuliano
Giorgio Boris Giuliano was a police chief from Palermo, Sicily. He was the head of Palermo's Flying Squad ....
who was investigating the Mafia’s heroin trafficking and had contacted Ambrosoli just two weeks before to compare investigations.
While under indictment in the US, Sindona staged a bogus kidnapping in August 1979 to conceal a mysterious 11-week trip to Sicily before his scheduled fraud trial. Bontade’s brother in law Giacomo Vitale (a freemason, like Bontade) was one of the persons who organised Sindona’s travel. The real purpose of the kidnapping was to issue sparsely disguised blackmail notes to Sindona’s past political allies – among them Prime Minister Giulio Andreotti
Giulio Andreotti
Giulio Andreotti is an Italian politician of the now dissolved centrist Christian Democracy party. He served as the 42nd Prime Minister of Italy from 1972 to 1973, from 1976 to 1979 and from 1989 to 1992. He also served as Minister of the Interior , Defense Minister and Foreign Minister and he...
– to engineer the rescue of his banks and recuperate Cosa Nostra’s money. The plot failed and after his “release” Sindona surrendered to the FBI.
The Sindona-affair showed the close links between the Mafia and certain important business men, freemasons and politicians. In the aftermath of the investigations it appeared that many of them were connected through the secret P2 lodge (Propaganda Due
Propaganda Due
Propaganda Due , or P2, was a Masonic lodge operating under the jurisdiction of the Grand Orient of Italy from 1945 to 1976 , and a pseudo-Masonic or "black" or "covert" lodge operating illegally from 1976 to...
) of Licio Gelli
Licio Gelli
Licio Gelli is an Italian financier, chiefly known for his role in the Banco Ambrosiano scandal. He was revealed in 1981 as being the Venerable Master of the clandestine Masonic lodge Propaganda Due...
.
Political connections
Stefano Bontade was very well connected. He was a member of a freemason lodge and had links with the Christian Democrat politician Salvo Lima (DC – Democrazia Cristiana) and Antonio SalvoAntonio Salvo
Antonio Nino Salvo and his cousin Ignazio Salvo were two wealthy businessmen from the town of Salemi in the province of Trapani. They had strong political connections with the Christian Democrat party , in particular with the former mayor of Palermo, Salvo Lima, and Giulio Andreotti...
and Ignazio Salvo, two wealthy mafia-cousins from Salemi
Salemi
Salemi is a town and comune in South-Western Sicily, Italy, administratively part of the province of Trapani. It is located in the Belice Valley.-History:...
who acted as the tax collectors on the island (tax collection was contracted out by the government). Through them Bontade had access to Giulio Andreotti
Giulio Andreotti
Giulio Andreotti is an Italian politician of the now dissolved centrist Christian Democracy party. He served as the 42nd Prime Minister of Italy from 1972 to 1973, from 1976 to 1979 and from 1989 to 1992. He also served as Minister of the Interior , Defense Minister and Foreign Minister and he...
. Italy’s highest court, the Court of Cassation, ruled in October 2004 that Andreotti had "friendly and even direct ties" with top men in the so-called moderate wing of Cosa Nostra, Stefano Bontade and Gaetano Badalamenti
Gaetano Badalamenti
Gaetano Badalamenti 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...
, favoured by the connection between them and Salvo Lima.
According to pentito Francesco Marino Mannoia
Francesco Marino Mannoia
Francesco Marino Mannoia is a former member of the Sicilian Mafia who became a pentito in 1989. His nickname was Mozzarella. He is considered to be one of the most reliable government witnesses against the Mafia...
, Andreotti contacted Bontade to try to prevent the Mafia from killing DC-politician Piersanti Mattarella
Piersanti Mattarella
Piersanti Mattarella was an Italian politician. He was assassinated by the Mafia while he held the position of President of the Regional Government of Sicily.-Background and early career:...
. Mattarella became the President of the autonomous Sicilian Region in 1978 and wanted to clean up the government’s public contracts racket that benefitted Cosa Nostra. Bontade and other mafiosi felt betrayed by Mattarella (his father Bernardo Mattarella
Bernardo Mattarella
Bernardo Mattarella was an Italian politician for the Christian Democrat party . He has been Minister of Italy several times...
was rumored to be associated with the Mafia, but all accusations against him were not proven before any court of law).
Andreotti’s attempt failed. After the murder of Mattarella on January 6, 1980, Andreotti again contacted Bontade to try to straighten things out. However, according to Marino Mannoia, Bontade told Andreotti: "we are in charge in Sicily, and unless you want the whole DC canceled out, you do as we say."
Stefano Bontade was also in touch with Silvio Berlusconi
Silvio Berlusconi
Silvio Berlusconi , also known as Il Cavaliere – from knighthood to the Order of Merit for Labour which he received in 1977 – is an Italian politician and businessman who served three terms as Prime Minister of Italy, from 1994 to 1995, 2001 to 2006, and 2008 to 2011. Berlusconi is also the...
in the mid-1970s, when Berlusconi still was just a wealthy real estate developer and started his private television empire (Berlusconi became prime minister in 1994, 2001–2006, and again from 2008). Bontade visited Berlusconi's villa in Arcore on the outskirts of Milan
Milan
Milan is the second-largest city in Italy and the capital city of the region of Lombardy and of the province of Milan. The city proper has a population of about 1.3 million, while its urban area, roughly coinciding with its administrative province and the bordering Province of Monza and Brianza ,...
, according to Antonino Giuffrè
Antonino Giuffrè
Antonino "Nino" Giuffrè is an Italian mafioso from Caccamo in the Province of Palermo, Sicily. He became one of the most important Mafia turncoats after his arrest in April 2002....
, a mafioso who was a key aide to Mafia kingpin Bernardo Provenzano
Bernardo Provenzano
Bernardo Provenzano is a member of the Sicilian Mafia and is suspected of having been the head of the Corleonesi, a Mafia faction that originated in the village of Corleone, and de facto capo di tutti capi of the entire Sicilian Mafia until his arrest in 2006.His nickname is Binnu u tratturi...
but turned state witness after his arrest in April 2002. Bontade’s contact at Arcore was the late Vittorio Mangano
Vittorio Mangano
Vittorio Mangano was a member of the Sicilian Mafia or Cosa Nostra. He was well known as the stable keeper at the villa of Silvio Berlusconi in Arcore in the 1970s and as such Mangano is known as "lo stalliere di Arcore"...
, a convicted mafioso who used to be a stable manager there. "When Vittorio Mangano got the job in the Arcore villa, Stefano Bontade and some of his close aides used to meet Berlusconi using visits to Mangano as an excuse," Giuffrè said. Berlusconi's lawyer dismissed Giuffrè's testimony as "false" and an attempt to discredit the Prime Minister and his party.
Sicilian Mafia Commission
In 1970, the Sicilian Mafia CommissionSicilian Mafia Commission
The Sicilian Mafia Commission, known as Commissione or Cupola, is a body of leading Mafia members to decide on important questions concerning the actions of, and settling disputes within the Sicilian Mafia or Cosa Nostra...
was revived. It consisted of ten members but would initially be ruled by a triumvirate consisting of Gaetano Badalamenti
Gaetano Badalamenti
Gaetano Badalamenti 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...
, Stefano Bontade and the Corleonesi
Corleonesi
The Corleonesi is the name given to a faction within the Sicilian Mafia that dominated Cosa Nostra in the 1980s and the 1990s. It was called the Corleonesi because its most important leaders came from the town of Corleone, first Luciano Leggio and later Totò Riina, Bernardo Provenzano and Leoluca...
boss Luciano Leggio
Luciano Leggio
Luciano Leggio was an Italian criminal and leading figure of the Sicilian Mafia. He was the head of the Corleonesi, the Mafia faction that originated in the town of Corleone...
, although it was Salvatore Riina
Salvatore Riina
Salvatore "Totò" Riina is a member of the Sicilian Mafia who became the most powerful member of the criminal organization in the early 1980s. Fellow mobsters nicknamed him The Beast due to his violent nature, or sometimes The Short One due to his diminutive stature...
who actually would represent the Corleonesi. At the time Bontade was emerging as one of the Sicilian Mafia’s acknowledged leaders. Young, rich, personable, intelligent and judicious, as well as the son of a renowned Mafia boss, it all made Bontade an undisputed candidate to sit on the Sicilian Mafia Commission
Sicilian Mafia Commission
The Sicilian Mafia Commission, known as Commissione or Cupola, is a body of leading Mafia members to decide on important questions concerning the actions of, and settling disputes within the Sicilian Mafia or Cosa Nostra...
. In 1975 the full Commission was reconstituted under the leadership of Badalamenti.
The Mafia Commission was meant to settle disputes and keep the peace, but Leggio and his stand-in and successor, Salvatore Riina
Salvatore Riina
Salvatore "Totò" Riina is a member of the Sicilian Mafia who became the most powerful member of the criminal organization in the early 1980s. Fellow mobsters nicknamed him The Beast due to his violent nature, or sometimes The Short One due to his diminutive stature...
, were plotting to decimate the Palermo clans, including Bontade and Bontade's ally, Salvatore Inzerillo
Salvatore Inzerillo
Salvatore Inzerillo was an Italian criminal, a member of the Sicilian Mafia, also known as Totuccio . He rose to be a powerful boss of Palermo's Passo di Rigano family...
. At the close of 1978, the leadership of the Sicilian Mafia changed. Gaetano Badalamenti, was expelled from the Commission and Michele Greco
Michele Greco
Michele Greco was a member of the Sicilian Mafia, previously incarcerated for multiple murders. His nickname was "il Papa" because of his ability to mediate between different Mafia families...
replaced him. This marked the end of a period of relative peace and signified a major change in the Mafia itself. Greco was actually allied with Salvatore Riina, and he subsequently used his position to lure many more of Bontade's friends to their deaths in the subsequent Mafia War. Historically, the Greco clan was at odds with Bontate.
Second Mafia War
Second Mafia War
The Second Mafia War was a conflict within the Sicilian Mafia, mostly taking place in the early 1980s. As with any criminal organization, the history of the Sicilian Mafia is replete with conflicts and power struggles, and the violence that results from them, but these are generally localised and...
raged from 1981 to 1983. In fact, two wars were being waged simultaneously by the Corleonesi
Corleonesi
The Corleonesi is the name given to a faction within the Sicilian Mafia that dominated Cosa Nostra in the 1980s and the 1990s. It was called the Corleonesi because its most important leaders came from the town of Corleone, first Luciano Leggio and later Totò Riina, Bernardo Provenzano and Leoluca...
clan. Riina had secretly formed an alliance of mafiosi in different families, cutting across clan divisions, in defiance of the rules concerning loyalty in Cosa Nostra. This secretive inter-family group would become known as the Corleonesi. The Corleonesi slaughtered the ruling families of the Palermo Mafia to take control of the organisation while waging a parallel war against Italian authorities and law enforcement to intimidate and prevent effective investigations and prosecutions.
The Corleonesi initiated the war against the coalition led by Bontade and Badalamenti to try to control heroin trafficking. Despite the larger economic means and the wider international network, the Bontade-Spatola-Inzerillo-Badalamenti network was unable to withstand the ruthless violence of the Corleonesi. The most important members of the Inzerillo, Spatola and Gambino clans were arrested in March 1980 for heroin trafficking, which undermined Bontade’s position significantly.
On April 23, 1981, whilst driving home from his 42nd birthday party, Bontade was machine gunned to death in his car, a Giulietta 2000
Alfa Romeo Giulietta
The Alfa Romeo Giulietta was a subcompact automobile manufactured by the Italian car maker Alfa Romeo from 1954 to 1965. The Giulietta was introduced at the Turin Motor Show in 1954 and almost 132,000 were built in the Portello factory in Milan.The first Giulietta model was a coupé, the Giulietta...
, in Palermo. The slaying was carried out by Riina's favourite hitman Pino Greco also known as the "little old shoe" (scarpuzzedda) – a nephew of Michele Greco. Bontade’s close ally, Salvatore Inzerillo
Salvatore Inzerillo
Salvatore Inzerillo was an Italian criminal, a member of the Sicilian Mafia, also known as Totuccio . He rose to be a powerful boss of Palermo's Passo di Rigano family...
, was killed three weeks later with the same Kalashnikov
AK-47
The AK-47 is a selective-fire, gas-operated 7.62×39mm assault rifle, first developed in the Soviet Union by Mikhail Kalashnikov. It is officially known as Avtomat Kalashnikova . It is also known as a Kalashnikov, an "AK", or in Russian slang, Kalash.Design work on the AK-47 began in the last year...
.
Many of Bontade's friends, fellow mafiosi and relatives were cut down in the following months to prevent them from avenging the death of their boss. One of Bontade's close friends was Tommaso Buscetta
Tommaso Buscetta
Tommaso Buscetta was a Sicilian mafioso. Although he was not the first pentito in the Italian witness protection program, he is widely recognized as the first important one breaking omertà...
, who subsequently became a pentito
Pentito
Pentito designates people in Italy who, formerly part of criminal or terrorist organizations, following their arrests decide to "repent" and collaborate with the judicial system to help investigations...
(collaborating witness) after he was arrested in Brazil in 1983. Salvatore Contorno
Salvatore Contorno
Salvatore "Totuccio" Contorno is a former member of the Sicilian Mafia who turned into a state witness against Cosa Nostra in October 1984, following the example of Tommaso Buscetta. He gave detailed accounts of the inner-workings of the Sicilian Mafia...
, one of Bontade’s trusted aides, followed Buscetta’s example. They were the key witnesses that enabled prosecuting magistrates Giovanni Falcone
Giovanni Falcone
Giovanni Falcone was an Sicilian/Italian prosecuting magistrate born in Palermo, Sicily. From his office in the Palace of Justice in Palermo, he spent most of his professional life trying to overthrow the power of the Mafia in Sicily...
and Paolo Borsellino
Paolo Borsellino
Paolo Borsellino was an Italian anti-Mafia magistrate who was killed by a Mafia car bomb in Palermo, less than two months after his fellow anti-Mafia magistrate Giovanni Falcone had been assassinated....
and the Antimafia pool to successfully prosecute the Mafia in the Maxi Trial
Maxi Trial
The Maxi Trial was a criminal trial that took place in Sicily during the mid-1980s that saw hundreds of defendants on trial convicted for a multitude of crimes relating to Mafia activities, based primarily on testimony given in as evidence from a former boss turned informant...
in the mid 1980s.
Sources
- Dickie, John (2004). Cosa Nostra. A history of the Sicilian Mafia, London: Coronet, ISBN 0-340-82435-2
- Gambetta, Diego (1993).The Sicilian Mafia: The Business of Private Protection, London: Harvard University Press, ISBN 0-674-80742-1
- Paoli, Letizia (2003). Mafia Brotherhoods: Organized Crime, Italian Style, New York: Oxford University Press ISBN 0-19-515724-9
- Sterling, Claire (1990). Octopus. How the long reach of the Sicilian Mafia controls the global narcotics trade, New York: Simon & Schuster, ISBN 0-671-73402-4
- Stille, AlexanderAlexander StilleAlexander Stille 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...
(1995). Excellent Cadavers. The Mafia and the Death of the First Italian Republic, New York: Vintage ISBN 0-09-959491-9