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24 arrested in major anti-mafia operation in Italy

Xinhua, January 21, 2015 Adjust font size:

Italian police carried out a major operation against the Camorra crime syndicate in Naples, and arrested 24 people on Wednesday, local media reported.

Those arrested were suspected of rigging public contracts for the local public health service in Caserta province, with the help of local managers and politicians, ANSA news agency said.

A total of 10 people were brought to prison, while 14 others were placed under house arrest including the director general of the Sant Anna e San Sebastiano hospital and the manager of the local Caserta health agency.

Assets worth some 12 million euros (13.8 million U.S. dollars) were seized in the operation, including four companies, real estate and company shares.

Those arrested were charged with mafia association, corruption, bid rigging, and abuse of authority aggravated by mafia methods.

The operation targeted people allegedly belonging to the Casalesi family, a powerful Camorra clan operating from the province of Caserta near Naples.

According to investigators from the Anti-mafia Investigative Directorate (DIA), the Casalesi clan had "monopolized all supply contracts for the local health authority service in Caserta" over a period of 10 years.

The alleged Camorra affiliates would have moved in deep collusion with managers of the health service, entrepreneurs and local politicians, whose help was crucial to infiltrate the public agency on such a scale, local media said citing police sources.

A councilor in the Caserta province and a former member of the regional government were among the people put under house arrest. Both local politicians belong to the center-right Silvio Berlusconi's People of Freedom (PDL) party.

A third former PDL politician and ex-member of the Berlusconi government named Nicola Cosentino is involved in the probe. According to prosecutors, he had been "the political reference point for the criminal network" until his arrest in March 2013. The man is already under trial for mafia collusion.

Among those arrested was Elvira Zagaria, the sister of Casalesi's boss Michele Zagaria, who was captured by Italian police in December 2011 after 16 years on the run.

The woman may have played a leading role in the illegal business within the health service agency in Caserta, even more so after her husband died and all other male members of the Zagaria family were arrested in the last two years, prosecutors said. Endit