(ANSA) - ROME, NOV 7 - A Carabiniere and a retired
Carabiniere, a Camorra boss turned informant's son and a
businessmen were arrested Thursday in the 2010 Camora mafia
murder of Angelo Vassallo, the so-called 'fisherman-mayor' of
the seaside village of Pollica in southern Campania, who had
denounced a local drug trafficking ring allegedly involving
cops.
Vassallo, 56, was gunned down outside his home on September 5,
2010, having openly fought organized crime and building
speculators who have marred coasts and countryside all over the
Mezzogiorno.
Among his many battles to protect environmental and
cultural heritage along Italy's lovely Cilento coast, Vassallo
had denounced to police a drug trafficking ring operating around
Pollica that was found to have been run by a Calabrian
'Ndrangheta mafia clan from the Cosenza area.
Those arrested Thursday were: Carabinieri officer Fabio
Cagnazzo; the son of the boss and police informant Romolo
Ridosso of the Camorra Scafati Loreto-Ridosso clan; businessman
Giuseppe Ciprian; and former Carabinieri brigadier Lazzaro
Cioffi.
Vassallo was allegedly killed after having confided what he knew
about the affair to the former chief prosecutor of Vallo della
Lucania, Alfredo Greco, but before being able to formalize his
complaint to a carabiniere who Greco himself fully trusted.
Also according to the investigations, local Carabinier Colonel
Fabio Cagnazzo was allegedly involved in an activity to divert
the investigation and cover up its findings, an alleged
operation organized even before Vassallo was killed.
Green-Left Alliance (AVS) co-leader Angelo Bonelli asked "why
has it taken 14 years to arrest those responsible for the murder
of Vassallo, a man of legality, an environmentalist, who loved
his local area and always fought for it?"
Bonelli said he wanted to know if the officers arrested had been
"protected by higher-ups".
Ex premier Giuseppe Conte, leader of the populist opposition
5-Star Movement (M5S), hailed the "breakthrough" in (a) crime
(that) was born from Vassallo's boundless love for his land and
for the values ;;trampled by criminal clans, with the connivance
of state officials".
Vassallo's son Antonio told ANSA that he was pleased at the
"turning point in the investigations" and recalled that his
father had found out about the alleged drug trafficking "before
many investigators".
He said he now wanted to "see full light shed on those who
slowed down the investigations into my father's assassination".
Vassallo, who had an international reputation for his campaigns,
was shot dead shortly before his 57th birthday and shortly after
becoming mayor of Pollica for a fourth term.
A member of the Democratic Party, in the past he had also been a
provincial councilor in Salerno.
In addition to the office of mayor, he also held the position of
president of the Park Community, a consultative and proactive
body of the Cilento and Vallo di Diano National Park Authority,
made up of 80 municipalities of Cilento and Vallo di Diano and
eight mountain communities.
He had been president of the Alento Monte Stella Mountain
Community and president of the 'Slow Cities' in the world.
In 2009 he promoted the proposal to include the Mediterranean
diet among the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity; a
proposal that was accepted by UNESCO on November 16, 2010, in
Nairobi.
Vassallo then also founded the "Study Center for the
Mediterranean Diet".
Above all, he was known for his past as a fisherman and for his
love of the sea and the land, which had always guided him in his
work as an administrator.
An environmentalist, beloved by his fellow citizens, he is also
remembered for some unusual ordinances.
In January 2010 he signed one that provided for a fine of up to
a thousand euros for anyone caught throwing ash and cigarette
butts on the ground. (ANSA).