Vito Badalamenti
Encyclopedia
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...
. He is on the "Most wanted list" of the Italian ministry of the Interior since 1995.
Mafia heritage
Vito Badalamenti was born in CinisiCinisi
Cinisi is a town and a comune in the province of Palermo in Sicily. As of 2007 it had an estimated population of 12,100.-Geography:The town is part of the Palermo metropolitan area, borders with the municipalities of Carini and Terrasini and count the civil parish of Punta Raisi, seat of Palermo...
, Sicily
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,...
. He is the eldest son of Mafia boss 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...
, one-time boss of 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...
and a notorious heroin trafficker who was the principal defendant in the Pizza Connection Trial
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:...
in the mid 1980s in New York.
In 1981, at the start of the 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...
, Vito followed his father in voluntary exile after Badalamenti was expelled from Cosa Nostra by the rival faction of 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...
headed by Totò Riina. They moved to Brazil and later to Spain.
Pizza Connection
Vito Badalamenti was involved in the heroin trafficking activities of his father, known as the Pizza Connection. After extensive surveillance, the Spanish police arrested Vito and Gaetano Badalamenti in Madrid on April 8, 1984, capping a four-year undercover investigation by Italian and US law enforcement agencies on both sides of the Atlantic. The arrest set off a series of raids by the Federal Bureau of InvestigationFederal Bureau of Investigation
The Federal Bureau of Investigation is an agency of the United States Department of Justice that serves as both a federal criminal investigative body and an internal intelligence agency . The FBI has investigative jurisdiction over violations of more than 200 categories of federal crime...
throughout the United States.
Both were extradited to the United States on November 15, 1984. They were unable to post multimillion-dollar bails and remained in jail throughout the trial. On June 22, 1987, Vito was the only one acquitted at the Pizza Connection Trial, while his father was sentenced to 45 years in prison. In Italy, Vito Badalamenti received a six year sentence 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...
.
Fugitive
Vito Badalamenti is a fugitive since 1995. In 2000, the Italian police issued an international arrest warrant. He is alleged to be either in Australia or Brazil. He has not lost his contacts with Sicily, Mafia boss Salvatore Lo PiccoloSalvatore Lo Piccolo
Salvatore Lo Piccolo , also known as the Baron , is a Sicilian mafioso and one of the most powerful bosses of Palermo, Sicily. Lo Piccolo rose through the ranks of the Palermo mafia throughout the 1980s and he became the capo-mandamento of the San Lorenzo district in the early 1990s, replacing...
was in contact with Badalamenti before Lo Piccolo was arrested in November 2007.