Matteo Messina Denaro, Italy’s most-wanted mafia boss has been arrested in Sicily while he was undergoing treatment for cancer.
He was caught and whisked off to an undisclosed location by the Carabinieri after he visited the clinic for a session of chemotherapy.
Corriere Della Sera reported that Matteo Messina Denaro did not resist arrest and immediately identified himself as the person they were looking for. He was going by the name and identification; “Andrea Bonafede”.
He was said to be the boss of the notorious Cosa Nostra Mafia and even though he was yet to be caught, a trial had been held for him and he was sentenced to life in prison in 2002.
Matteo Messina Denaro who has been linked to numerous murders reportedly had over 100 armed officials involved in his arrest.
He was one of the Sicilian Mafia’s most influential and dangerous members, and became boss of the powerful Mafia family in Trapani, Sicily, after the arrest of his uncle, Salvatore “Toto” Riina, in 1993.
Some of the many crimes allegedly committed by Matteo Messina Denaro include:
- the 1992 killing of anti-Mafia prosecutors Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino,
- the deadly 1993 bomb attacks in Milan, Florence, and Rome
- the kidnapping, torture, and killing of the 11-year-old son of a mafioso-turned-state witness
He was also linked to many fraudulent business dealings, money laundering and drug trafficking for the powerful Cosa Nostra organized crime syndicate.
