Potenza, “Iceberg” operation: mafia-style criminal association dismantled by the police

Potenza has been underway since the early hours of this night a vast operation by the State Police, coordinated by the District Anti-Mafia Directorate of the Public Prosecutor's Office of Potenza, to dismantle a mafia-style criminal association rooted in the municipality of Pignola (in the province of Potenza) whose members, however, are also found outside the Basilicata Region.

Today, on the orders of the District Anti-Mafia Directorate of the Potenza Prosecutor's Office, the Potenza Flying Squad - Organized Crime Section, with the support of the Potenza Financial Police - Organized Crime Investigative Group which dealt with some of the financial aspects of the investigation, executed the order with which, at the request of this Office, the investigating judge of the Lucanian capital ordered the application of precautionary custody measures in prison against RS, RV, RD, MA, QA, RM, CG, PG, LG, SS, RG, of house arrest against NB, DR, DG, and of the obligation to submit to the PG against TMA, TMM, RV, as well as the contextual decree with which the preventive seizure of the shares and of the corporate complex of the companies “Bar del Tribunal srl” and “Gioca e Vinci srls”.

The measure was adopted following a vast, detailed and complex investigative activity coordinated by the Potenza DDA which made it possible to shed light on the existence and strong rooting in the territory of the RIVIEZZI di Pignola mafia clan but, in fact, operational throughout the province of Potenza, also thanks to alliances and synergies with other mafia organisations, both indigenous, such as the CASSOTTA clan, and Calabrian, where the Riviezzi enjoy particular support and consideration, and Campania, with projections, in the narcotics sector, also abroad..

The careful investigative work carried out by the District Attorney's Office with the constant and very important support of the Organized Crime Section of the local Flying Squad, developed over the course of a two-year period during which the copious investigative material acquired, composed, among other things, from wiretaps, statements from witnesses and collaborators of justice, inspections, documentary acquisitions, verifications, shadowing, it was carefully analyzed and put back into the system, revealing the full operation of the Pignolese association and its endemic interpenetration in the institutional and entrepreneurial fabric of the Potenza area, to the point to be able to influence some sectors of the local public administration, to govern the forestry procurement system and to infiltrate, since 2017, as a sign of bold self-affirmation in a symbolic place, as well as of economic availability, in the management of the bar- cafeteria of the Palace of Justice, thus giving a striking demonstration of its strength towards the outside and at the same time guaranteeing itself a privileged observatory inside a crucial building in the system of protection and restoration of legality.

The investigations, in fact, have shown how the companies that have succeeded each other since 2017 in the management of the bar-cafeteria service in the Palace of Justice of Potenza, although registered in the name of simple frontmen, took turns until last November, according to a useful turnover to effectively shield the interposition, have up to now been managed, in fact, by subjects belonging to or in any case contiguous to the association.

In this context, serious extortionate conduct perpetrated in April 2018 by an affiliate of the association, MA, also emerged, to the detriment of the representative of an aspiring awardee company with the aim of making her withdraw from the appeal to the Regional Administrative Court against the award.

This is the same person, whose arrest, which took place two months later, together with the boss and other members of the clan for international drug trafficking, aroused scenes of tears and emotion right inside the bar-cafe immortalized by the environmental video interceptions installed at the interior of the room.

The meticulous reconstructive effort also made it possible to shed light on the full involvement of two members of the clan in the mafia murder of TETTA Giancarlo on 2 April 2008, perpetrated in the context of the long and bloody feud that has marked the history of relations since 1991 between the hostile Melfi clans of DI MURO and CASSOTTA. Starting from an investigative lead that had already emerged in previous years, but never developed, a rigorous in-depth investigation was carried out by collecting specific declarations and meticulously verifying them with inspections and comparisons with the investigations already carried out in the past.

In this way, by recomposing the mosaics of a real investigative puzzle, it was possible to bring to light the complicity of the mafia boss RIVIEZZI Saverio and one of his affiliates, QA, in the TETTA murder to which they knowingly contributed, providing the murderers, affiliated to the CASSOTTA clan, the Fiat Croma car stolen a few days earlier in Potenza and used to reach and kill the victim with eight gunshots. 7,65 before setting it on fire.

The investigative activity made it possible to highlight, overall, the particular intimidating force that the RIVIEZZI clan is able to express and which appears to have been used during various extortion acts against entrepreneurs and traders perpetrated by its affiliates over a period of time ranging from 2013 onwards and up to recent times.

On this point, appreciation must also be expressed towards the ROS of the Carabinieri, who in a collective investigative effort, ascertained a specific and symptomatic extortion activity of the association in the city of Potenza.

The investigative findings also collected in the context of previous operations, such as the one already mentioned for international cocaine trafficking, were analysed, valorised and compared with a series of further elements and evidence which made it possible to lead back to the criminal action of the clan, including the attempted armed robbery perpetrated in September 2017 against the Potenza Post Office - Via Grippo and the aggravated theft perpetrated in June 2018 against the Potenza Post Office - Via Messina, where they came from 235.000,00 euros removed.

The activity carried out so far, with the personal and real precautionary outcomes that have resulted, represents a result of absolute importance in the fight against organized crime (which operates in a significant and significant way in Basilicata and also in the province of Potenza despite the fact that there are no rarely an underestimation of the phenomenon) effort instead pursued daily by this District Anti-Mafia Directorate with the indispensable and essential support of the judicial police. A press conference will be held at 11 am in the Palace of Justice.