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This programme contains some scenes which some viewers may find upsetting. | 0:00:02 | 0:00:07 | |
There's a new front line in the war against organised crime. | 0:00:07 | 0:00:11 | |
Carabinieri! | 0:00:11 | 0:00:13 | |
'In southern Italy's rugged highlands, | 0:00:14 | 0:00:17 | |
'a previously unknown criminal group meets.' | 0:00:17 | 0:00:20 | |
It was just about here that some of the top bosses were standing | 0:00:22 | 0:00:25 | |
having their secret meeting. | 0:00:25 | 0:00:27 | |
Called the Ndrangheta, | 0:00:27 | 0:00:30 | |
its bosses are Europe's biggest cocaine traffickers. | 0:00:30 | 0:00:34 | |
Carabinieri! | 0:00:34 | 0:00:36 | |
The police are fighting back, | 0:00:36 | 0:00:39 | |
forcing Mafiosi underground... | 0:00:39 | 0:00:41 | |
..into bizarre and sophisticated bunkers. | 0:00:43 | 0:00:45 | |
Holy moley. | 0:00:53 | 0:00:56 | |
'From here, they run their criminal empires, | 0:00:56 | 0:01:00 | |
'protected by a wall of silence.' | 0:01:00 | 0:01:03 | |
They dug up the whole street to bury their bunkers... | 0:01:03 | 0:01:06 | |
..and nobody breathed a word! | 0:01:08 | 0:01:10 | |
This is the story of a little-known Mafia, | 0:01:14 | 0:01:17 | |
whose secret inner workings are only now coming to light. | 0:01:17 | 0:01:21 | |
This is Calabria, | 0:01:37 | 0:01:39 | |
a beautiful and blighted region at the very tip of Italy's boot. | 0:01:39 | 0:01:43 | |
As a historian, I've spent years studying Italian organised crime. | 0:01:44 | 0:01:49 | |
Now I've come to this mountainous peninsula, | 0:01:49 | 0:01:52 | |
a stone's throw from the island of Sicily, | 0:01:52 | 0:01:55 | |
to investigate Italy's most mysterious and powerful Mafia, | 0:01:55 | 0:02:00 | |
the Ndrangheta. | 0:02:00 | 0:02:02 | |
The Cacciatore, the hunters, are an elite law-enforcement unit. | 0:02:09 | 0:02:15 | |
They've agreed to take me deep into Ndrangheta territory. | 0:02:15 | 0:02:19 | |
Lieutenant Angelo Zizzi and his men | 0:02:42 | 0:02:44 | |
often have to operate under the cover of darkness. | 0:02:44 | 0:02:47 | |
'After two-and-a-half hours | 0:03:04 | 0:03:06 | |
'we reach a small village high up in the mountains. | 0:03:06 | 0:03:09 | |
'It's four in the morning.' | 0:03:11 | 0:03:12 | |
With the mist on the mountains here, and the silence, | 0:03:21 | 0:03:24 | |
there's something really spooky about this place. | 0:03:24 | 0:03:27 | |
'Now abandoned, this house was once used as a base | 0:03:32 | 0:03:36 | |
'by Calabrian criminals.' | 0:03:36 | 0:03:38 | |
There's something fiendishly clever about this mechanism, | 0:04:08 | 0:04:12 | |
the kind of James Bond villain fashion. | 0:04:12 | 0:04:14 | |
'The concealed entrance leads to a narrow passage.' | 0:04:26 | 0:04:29 | |
It's pretty tight in here. | 0:04:32 | 0:04:34 | |
'This secret hideout was discovered almost by chance | 0:04:36 | 0:04:39 | |
'when the team were pursuing a group of Ndranghetan gangsters. | 0:04:39 | 0:04:43 | |
'When Zizzi and his team first entered, | 0:04:50 | 0:04:52 | |
'there was no sign of the men they were after. | 0:04:52 | 0:04:55 | |
'What they'd stumbled upon was not just one concealed bunker, | 0:05:20 | 0:05:24 | |
'it was a whole warren of underground passageways, | 0:05:24 | 0:05:28 | |
'false walls and secret rooms. | 0:05:28 | 0:05:30 | |
'The tunnels fan out under the village, | 0:05:55 | 0:05:57 | |
'linking hideouts and escape routes.' | 0:05:57 | 0:06:00 | |
So the tunnel system was a kind of map of the Ndrangheta network | 0:06:00 | 0:06:03 | |
in this village. | 0:06:03 | 0:06:05 | |
'It's a claustrophobic maze, completely disorientating.' | 0:06:09 | 0:06:12 | |
This is a completely different house. | 0:06:26 | 0:06:28 | |
It's a completely different house. | 0:06:28 | 0:06:31 | |
Another secret entrance under the stairs | 0:06:31 | 0:06:35 | |
and we're into a completely new house. | 0:06:35 | 0:06:39 | |
Absolutely amazing. | 0:06:40 | 0:06:42 | |
'By the time I got out, dawn had broken.' | 0:06:44 | 0:06:47 | |
We came in somewhere over there! | 0:06:49 | 0:06:52 | |
When the Cacciatore got into the first part of this system, | 0:06:54 | 0:06:57 | |
there were six people in there. | 0:06:57 | 0:07:00 | |
The Cacciatore had surrounded the whole area, | 0:07:00 | 0:07:02 | |
and there was a chase through this bunker system | 0:07:02 | 0:07:05 | |
with its different exits, each Cacciatore having to follow | 0:07:05 | 0:07:08 | |
a different Ndranghetisti as he made his escape. | 0:07:08 | 0:07:11 | |
Three of the Ndranghetisti got away, | 0:07:11 | 0:07:14 | |
and having been through that system of tunnels, I can really see why. | 0:07:14 | 0:07:18 | |
Building a subterranean labyrinth was a major enterprise. | 0:07:22 | 0:07:26 | |
Somebody must have noticed all the work going on, | 0:07:26 | 0:07:29 | |
but not a soul told the authorities. | 0:07:29 | 0:07:31 | |
For more than a century, the men of the Ndrangheta | 0:07:32 | 0:07:35 | |
have been the undisputed authority in these mountain villages. | 0:07:35 | 0:07:39 | |
To understand the nature of their dominance, | 0:07:39 | 0:07:42 | |
you need to understand the geography of Calabria. | 0:07:42 | 0:07:45 | |
And that means taking to the air. | 0:07:45 | 0:07:48 | |
This is very exciting... for two reasons - | 0:07:54 | 0:07:57 | |
one, because I've never been in a helicopter before, | 0:07:57 | 0:08:01 | |
and two, because now we're going to see | 0:08:01 | 0:08:03 | |
some of the wildest parts of Calabria from the air. | 0:08:03 | 0:08:06 | |
We took off from the city of Reggio Calabria, | 0:08:11 | 0:08:14 | |
one of the Mafia power bases on the coast. | 0:08:14 | 0:08:17 | |
But the heart of Ndrangheta territory is Aspromonte, | 0:08:17 | 0:08:21 | |
"the harsh mountain". | 0:08:21 | 0:08:23 | |
There's no other word for Aspromonte but majestic. | 0:08:29 | 0:08:33 | |
An extraordinary sight! | 0:08:33 | 0:08:35 | |
Aspromonte is inaccessible. | 0:08:38 | 0:08:40 | |
The law has never had much of a foothold here. | 0:08:42 | 0:08:45 | |
The Ndrangheta is a secret society of criminals, | 0:08:47 | 0:08:51 | |
and for a long time these remote mountain settlements | 0:08:51 | 0:08:54 | |
have been its fortresses. | 0:08:54 | 0:08:56 | |
In the 1970s and '80s, | 0:08:59 | 0:09:00 | |
the Ndrangheta took to kidnapping for ransom, | 0:09:00 | 0:09:03 | |
using these remote mountains to hide the captives, | 0:09:03 | 0:09:08 | |
often for years. | 0:09:08 | 0:09:09 | |
Each of these villages is controlled by a different clan. | 0:09:13 | 0:09:16 | |
If you know where to look, it's not hard to see who's in charge. | 0:09:21 | 0:09:25 | |
We're about to fly over a villa | 0:09:27 | 0:09:29 | |
that a Ndrangheta boss had built for himself. And he wanted it | 0:09:29 | 0:09:33 | |
to look exactly like Tony Montana's villa in Scarface, the movie. | 0:09:33 | 0:09:39 | |
I suppose all gangsters are gangster wannabes at heart. | 0:09:39 | 0:09:44 | |
Today, the main source of the Ndrangheta's wealth and power | 0:09:50 | 0:09:54 | |
lies 20 minutes' flight northwest, at the port of Gioia Tauro. | 0:09:54 | 0:09:59 | |
Opened in the 1990s, | 0:10:04 | 0:10:06 | |
Gioia Tauro is now the biggest container port in the Mediterranean. | 0:10:06 | 0:10:10 | |
It should have been good news for this underdeveloped region. | 0:10:10 | 0:10:14 | |
For the Ndrangheta, | 0:10:39 | 0:10:40 | |
the port of Gioia Tauro is the hen that laid the golden eggs. | 0:10:40 | 0:10:44 | |
Extorting a protection payment on every container is just the start. | 0:10:50 | 0:10:55 | |
The main illegal business here is smuggling. | 0:10:55 | 0:10:59 | |
TRANSLATION: Ordinary commercial routes are used as Trojan horses. | 0:11:01 | 0:11:05 | |
From bananas to frozen prawns, | 0:11:07 | 0:11:09 | |
from iron to hazelnuts. | 0:11:09 | 0:11:12 | |
Any cargo shipped from South America to Europe, | 0:11:13 | 0:11:16 | |
and the port of Gioia Tauro, | 0:11:16 | 0:11:18 | |
can be used as cover for Ndrangheta's cocaine. | 0:11:18 | 0:11:22 | |
Thousands of containers pass through the port every day. | 0:11:29 | 0:11:32 | |
It's impossible to check and scan more than a handful of them. | 0:11:32 | 0:11:36 | |
The best chance of catching the cocaine shipment | 0:11:36 | 0:11:39 | |
is through intelligence on the ground, | 0:11:39 | 0:11:41 | |
but even there, the criminals are often one step ahead. | 0:11:41 | 0:11:45 | |
TRANSLATION: The Ndrangheta plant their own men in the port. | 0:11:47 | 0:11:50 | |
Just like we watch them, they watch us. | 0:11:50 | 0:11:53 | |
The sheer scale of this place is awe-inspiring. | 0:11:57 | 0:12:01 | |
The ships are like tower blocks, | 0:12:01 | 0:12:03 | |
the piles of containers go on for kilometres, and if you think | 0:12:03 | 0:12:07 | |
that a big load of cocaine is about the size of a wardrobe, | 0:12:07 | 0:12:11 | |
it makes it very clear that the old cliche | 0:12:11 | 0:12:13 | |
about looking for a needle in a haystack just doesn't come close. | 0:12:13 | 0:12:18 | |
It's estimated no more than 20% of the cocaine coming through the port | 0:12:18 | 0:12:24 | |
is intercepted by the authorities. | 0:12:24 | 0:12:27 | |
But even that amounts to an impressive haul. | 0:12:27 | 0:12:30 | |
A 100,000 euros just for that, | 0:13:15 | 0:13:18 | |
just for that and look at it. | 0:13:18 | 0:13:20 | |
This is a whole wardrobe full of the stuff. | 0:13:20 | 0:13:23 | |
And that's not all. | 0:13:37 | 0:13:38 | |
Wow! | 0:13:41 | 0:13:43 | |
'Three tons of pure cocaine have been seized here | 0:13:55 | 0:13:58 | |
'in the last two years.' | 0:13:58 | 0:14:00 | |
And of course this is only a tiny part of the total amount of cocaine | 0:14:02 | 0:14:08 | |
that's flooding through the port of Gioia Tauro. | 0:14:08 | 0:14:12 | |
This is quite extraordinary. | 0:14:13 | 0:14:15 | |
The Calabrian Mafia, the Ndrangheta, is today the biggest | 0:14:17 | 0:14:21 | |
cocaine-trafficking syndicate in Europe. | 0:14:21 | 0:14:24 | |
The trade is global, but some of the profits end up close to home. | 0:14:24 | 0:14:28 | |
Overlooking the port is the town of Rosarno - | 0:14:31 | 0:14:34 | |
home to one of the Ndrangheta's most ruthless cells... | 0:14:34 | 0:14:37 | |
..the Pesce clan. | 0:14:39 | 0:14:41 | |
Carabinieri Special Agent Giuseppe Lumia | 0:14:53 | 0:14:56 | |
knows more about the Pesce clan than anyone. | 0:14:56 | 0:14:59 | |
As well as cocaine-trafficking, | 0:15:12 | 0:15:14 | |
the Pesce clan grew rich from extortion and fraud. | 0:15:14 | 0:15:18 | |
In this small, rundown town, | 0:15:19 | 0:15:21 | |
the clan members enjoyed the good life, | 0:15:21 | 0:15:24 | |
none more so than their chief, Ciccio Pesce. | 0:15:24 | 0:15:28 | |
The house occupies a position like a baron's castle in the old days. | 0:16:05 | 0:16:09 | |
At 30 years of age, Ciccio Pesce became the youngest known boss | 0:16:11 | 0:16:15 | |
of an Ndrangheta clan. His swift rise to power | 0:16:15 | 0:16:19 | |
was witnessed by a man who has since become one of the very few | 0:16:19 | 0:16:22 | |
Calabrian Mafiosi to turn State witness. | 0:16:22 | 0:16:26 | |
For security reasons, we can't reveal his identity. | 0:16:26 | 0:16:30 | |
We'll call him Tony. | 0:16:30 | 0:16:31 | |
What kind of man is Ciccio Pesce? | 0:16:34 | 0:16:36 | |
TRANSLATION: I've known him since he was a child, Ciccio Pesce. | 0:16:39 | 0:16:42 | |
When he was 14 or 15, on New Year's Eve, | 0:16:42 | 0:16:45 | |
he went round town with his friends with some Kalashnikovs. | 0:16:45 | 0:16:48 | |
He sprayed the streets and the shop shutters with bullets. | 0:16:50 | 0:16:54 | |
There was no particular reason to do so. He just wanted to make a mess, | 0:16:54 | 0:16:58 | |
because power was growing in his hands. | 0:16:58 | 0:17:01 | |
Extreme violence was the basis of Ciccio Pesce's power. | 0:17:01 | 0:17:05 | |
TRANSLATION: People respected him out of fear. | 0:17:08 | 0:17:10 | |
They were scared of rebelling, | 0:17:10 | 0:17:12 | |
because he'd become the absolute ruler of our area. | 0:17:12 | 0:17:15 | |
As one of the poorest regions in Europe, | 0:17:17 | 0:17:20 | |
Calabria received huge subsidies from the European Union | 0:17:20 | 0:17:23 | |
for public construction works and farming. Mobsters like Ciccio Pesce | 0:17:23 | 0:17:28 | |
have stolen much of that money. | 0:17:28 | 0:17:30 | |
Tony helped Pesce make millions through a colossal scam involving... | 0:17:30 | 0:17:34 | |
oranges! | 0:17:34 | 0:17:36 | |
TRANSLATION: The oranges had to be delivered to a plant, | 0:17:40 | 0:17:42 | |
but we wouldn't take anything there. | 0:17:42 | 0:17:45 | |
We would take the paperwork the night before, however, | 0:17:46 | 0:17:49 | |
and in the morning it would be signed by corrupt officials, | 0:17:49 | 0:17:52 | |
saying the oranges had been delivered. | 0:17:52 | 0:17:54 | |
After 90 days, we would receive the funds for the oranges | 0:17:54 | 0:17:58 | |
from the European Union. | 0:17:58 | 0:18:00 | |
And how much did you make in an average year? | 0:18:03 | 0:18:07 | |
TRANSLATION: I was small fry, but in a good year | 0:18:09 | 0:18:11 | |
I could make 300,000 to 400,000 euros from oranges. | 0:18:11 | 0:18:15 | |
And a boss like Ciccio Pesce, how much would he make? | 0:18:15 | 0:18:19 | |
Someone like Ciccio Pesce, who owned the farms, the plants, | 0:18:20 | 0:18:24 | |
the transport companies, everything - | 0:18:24 | 0:18:26 | |
he'd make, out of the oranges scam alone, | 0:18:26 | 0:18:29 | |
some five to six million euros a year. | 0:18:29 | 0:18:32 | |
The clan would invest the money in drugs and weapons, | 0:18:34 | 0:18:37 | |
and they would double it, even treble it. | 0:18:37 | 0:18:39 | |
The Ndrangheta is highly territorial. | 0:18:41 | 0:18:44 | |
When they fall foul of the law, | 0:18:44 | 0:18:46 | |
bosses like Ciccio Pesce very rarely take flight. | 0:18:46 | 0:18:50 | |
Instead, they go to ground close to home. | 0:18:50 | 0:18:54 | |
TRANSLATION: The man of honour, the leader, never leaves his own turf. | 0:18:55 | 0:18:59 | |
For them, a bunker is a investment if someone needs to lay low for a while, | 0:19:03 | 0:19:08 | |
hoping the police will lose interest in them. | 0:19:08 | 0:19:11 | |
Many of these bunkers were made of old shipping containers, | 0:19:15 | 0:19:18 | |
sunk into the soil of the orange groves | 0:19:18 | 0:19:21 | |
and kitted out with everything a boss would need to lie low. | 0:19:21 | 0:19:25 | |
Of course a bunker is only safe if its location is kept secret. | 0:19:29 | 0:19:34 | |
In Calabria, where the Ndrangheta is more feared than the law, | 0:19:39 | 0:19:43 | |
the blanket of silence known as Omerta | 0:19:43 | 0:19:47 | |
is as thick as anywhere in Italy. | 0:19:47 | 0:19:50 | |
So it's not surprising | 0:19:53 | 0:19:55 | |
that not many people have broken the regime of Omerta. | 0:19:55 | 0:19:58 | |
I'm on my way now to find out what happens when you do. | 0:20:00 | 0:20:03 | |
I've been given an address some ten miles south of Rosarno. | 0:20:11 | 0:20:15 | |
It looks like my arrival is being closely monitored. | 0:20:24 | 0:20:27 | |
This fortified compound is where construction entrepreneur | 0:20:36 | 0:20:40 | |
Gaetano Saffioti lives and works. | 0:20:40 | 0:20:44 | |
'It's the only place Saffioti would agree to meet.' | 0:20:45 | 0:20:48 | |
THEY EXCHANGE GREETINGS | 0:20:48 | 0:20:50 | |
Saffioti's company grew from nothing | 0:21:01 | 0:21:04 | |
into a multi-million-pound business | 0:21:04 | 0:21:07 | |
until in 2002, the profits crashed. | 0:21:07 | 0:21:10 | |
For years, like most businesses in the area, | 0:21:19 | 0:21:22 | |
Saffioti had paid regular extortion money to the Ndrangheta, | 0:21:22 | 0:21:26 | |
but as he became more successful, | 0:21:26 | 0:21:28 | |
they wanted more and more control. | 0:21:28 | 0:21:31 | |
When he tried to buy a plot of land, the mobsters made their move. | 0:21:31 | 0:21:35 | |
TRANSLATION: And then what happened? | 0:21:37 | 0:21:38 | |
One night they set fire to my bulldozer | 0:21:38 | 0:21:40 | |
to tell me, "You've done something you shouldn't have." | 0:21:40 | 0:21:43 | |
Saffioti turned to the state for help, | 0:21:43 | 0:21:46 | |
but he soon learned who's really in charge in Calabria. | 0:21:46 | 0:21:49 | |
I went to report who'd done it, | 0:21:51 | 0:21:53 | |
I was told perhaps it's better you keep that to yourself - | 0:21:53 | 0:21:56 | |
you know how these things end up - | 0:21:56 | 0:21:58 | |
and my heart sank. | 0:21:58 | 0:22:00 | |
And so there is this facade of a state and there is this real state, | 0:22:01 | 0:22:05 | |
paradoxically, the real state is the Ndrangheta. | 0:22:05 | 0:22:09 | |
The campaign of intimidation escalated. | 0:22:09 | 0:22:12 | |
In the middle of the day, they showed up and threatened my staff, | 0:22:16 | 0:22:20 | |
including my brother. They gave him a tank of petrol and told him, | 0:22:20 | 0:22:24 | |
"Pour this petrol over the vehicle and set it alight." | 0:22:24 | 0:22:27 | |
Saffioti had been pushed to the edge. He decided to fight back. | 0:22:30 | 0:22:35 | |
For months, Saffioti risked his life to capture his tormentors on film, | 0:22:44 | 0:22:48 | |
as they came for their pay-off, | 0:22:48 | 0:22:51 | |
on this occasion, several thousand pounds. | 0:22:51 | 0:22:54 | |
In an unprecedented act, | 0:23:21 | 0:23:23 | |
Saffioti took this evidence to a public prosecutor. | 0:23:23 | 0:23:26 | |
On the night of January 25th 2002, | 0:23:26 | 0:23:30 | |
45 Ndrangheta members were arrested. | 0:23:30 | 0:23:34 | |
But this was not the end of Saffioti's problems. | 0:23:34 | 0:23:37 | |
When someone talks about one's life changing overnight, | 0:23:40 | 0:23:43 | |
it may sound exaggerated. | 0:23:43 | 0:23:45 | |
But in this case, my world was really turned upside down overnight. | 0:23:45 | 0:23:50 | |
My 65 employees must have learnt about the arrests before they came | 0:23:50 | 0:23:54 | |
out in the papers, | 0:23:54 | 0:23:56 | |
because in the morning only five showed up for work. | 0:23:56 | 0:23:59 | |
On the same day, all of our orders dried up. | 0:24:02 | 0:24:05 | |
The banks closed my accounts, even the active ones, | 0:24:08 | 0:24:11 | |
not just the overdrafts. Cancelling my overdrafts was bad enough, | 0:24:11 | 0:24:15 | |
but I couldn't even withdraw my own money. | 0:24:15 | 0:24:18 | |
It was completely absurd, I was ostracised by everyone, | 0:24:18 | 0:24:22 | |
as if I'd become a terrible criminal. | 0:24:22 | 0:24:25 | |
Many of Saffioti's friends shunned him. | 0:24:28 | 0:24:31 | |
In Calabria, even law-abiding citizens wouldn't risk defying | 0:24:31 | 0:24:35 | |
the Ndrangheta by being seen with a man like him. | 0:24:35 | 0:24:39 | |
45 bullets, one for each of the men that Saffioti had had arrested. | 0:24:59 | 0:25:04 | |
And then the police turned up. They said, ""e are here for you, | 0:25:07 | 0:25:11 | |
"because from now on, you're under protection." | 0:25:11 | 0:25:14 | |
That was it. | 0:25:15 | 0:25:16 | |
The beginning. | 0:25:16 | 0:25:19 | |
The situation in Calabria can seem incomprehensible at first glance, | 0:25:31 | 0:25:36 | |
but to really understand what's going on there, we need to take | 0:25:36 | 0:25:40 | |
a step back, or rather take a trip across the straits to Sicily. | 0:25:40 | 0:25:45 | |
This beautiful island has long been home to the notorious Cosa Nostra. | 0:25:52 | 0:25:56 | |
For the last 30 years, the Italian state has been struggling to contain | 0:25:56 | 0:26:00 | |
the most powerful criminal organisation in modern history. | 0:26:00 | 0:26:04 | |
Coming to Palermo today, you have to make an effort to remember | 0:26:16 | 0:26:20 | |
that 25 years ago, this was a city in the grip of terror. | 0:26:20 | 0:26:24 | |
The bloodiest Mafia war in history was going on. | 0:26:24 | 0:26:28 | |
Hundreds of people were being killed, bodies were being left | 0:26:29 | 0:26:32 | |
burning in the street or taken out to the sea and dumped. | 0:26:32 | 0:26:36 | |
Cosa Nostra was killing magistrates, | 0:26:36 | 0:26:38 | |
policemen, journalists, politicians. | 0:26:38 | 0:26:41 | |
That violence reached its savage climax | 0:26:41 | 0:26:45 | |
with the 1992 bombing assassinations of anti-Mafia judges | 0:26:45 | 0:26:50 | |
Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino. | 0:26:50 | 0:26:54 | |
Cosa Nostra had declared war on the state | 0:26:54 | 0:26:58 | |
and seemed to be winning. | 0:26:58 | 0:27:00 | |
TRANSLATION: It felt like the country was on its knees. | 0:27:04 | 0:27:08 | |
If they were able to blow up a motorway and kill magistrates | 0:27:08 | 0:27:11 | |
under the highest level of protection | 0:27:11 | 0:27:14 | |
and also kill our police colleagues escorting them, | 0:27:14 | 0:27:17 | |
then I felt this was an extremely powerful and terrifying organisation | 0:27:17 | 0:27:21 | |
which would stop at nothing. | 0:27:21 | 0:27:24 | |
It's been a long, hard road for the state to win back credibility. | 0:27:26 | 0:27:31 | |
A key success came in 2006 when, after 43 years on the run, | 0:27:31 | 0:27:36 | |
Cosa Nostra's boss of bosses was finally arrested. | 0:27:36 | 0:27:39 | |
TRANSLATION: The uncatchable had been caught. | 0:27:41 | 0:27:44 | |
In that moment, the people felt a burst of courage | 0:27:44 | 0:27:47 | |
and wanted to show it by coming to our Palermo headquarters | 0:27:47 | 0:27:50 | |
to express solidarity with us, | 0:27:50 | 0:27:53 | |
and the belief that this battle could be won. | 0:27:53 | 0:27:56 | |
If organised crime is to be defeated, | 0:27:58 | 0:28:00 | |
ordinary people need to be empowered to resist. | 0:28:00 | 0:28:04 | |
They have to believe that police and judges | 0:28:04 | 0:28:07 | |
are not in the pay of the mobsters, | 0:28:07 | 0:28:09 | |
and that those who stand up to the Mafia will be protected. | 0:28:09 | 0:28:13 | |
Now, in Sicily, that is beginning to happen. | 0:28:13 | 0:28:18 | |
We promote a sort of a rebellion, a cultural revolution again. | 0:28:18 | 0:28:22 | |
Edoardo Zaffuto is one of the founders of a grass-roots anti-Mafia group. | 0:28:22 | 0:28:27 | |
Addio Pizzo, or Farewell Extortion, | 0:28:27 | 0:28:30 | |
encourages ordinary Sicilians to come out and defy the Mafia. | 0:28:30 | 0:28:34 | |
Cosa Nostra works like a shadow state, using extortion as its tax. | 0:28:36 | 0:28:41 | |
Sometimes the Mafia ask just 10, 15 euros per month, | 0:28:44 | 0:28:48 | |
that's a nominal payment. It's important for the Mafia that here | 0:28:48 | 0:28:51 | |
and at the fish shop, as well as the vegetable shop | 0:28:51 | 0:28:55 | |
they accept to pay protection money. | 0:28:55 | 0:28:57 | |
So how many people do you think actually pay protection money | 0:28:57 | 0:29:01 | |
-in this market, for example? -80% of er... -80%? -Yes. | 0:29:01 | 0:29:06 | |
Just round the corner from the market | 0:29:06 | 0:29:10 | |
is a shop selling traditional Sicilian caps. | 0:29:10 | 0:29:13 | |
When we started our campaign we started to distribute these stickers | 0:29:15 | 0:29:20 | |
to the shopkeepers that are member of our campaign. | 0:29:20 | 0:29:23 | |
The stickers say, "I pay who does not pay." | 0:29:23 | 0:29:26 | |
So in a sense, I support those who say no to the Mafia. | 0:29:26 | 0:29:31 | |
It works like a sort of a beware to the dog sign, | 0:30:08 | 0:30:11 | |
you know, so it says, as soon as you will dare to ask pizzo here, | 0:30:11 | 0:30:16 | |
you will be immediately reported to the police. And the consumers | 0:30:16 | 0:30:20 | |
they know for sure just seeing this sticker that in this shop, um, | 0:30:20 | 0:30:25 | |
not a single cent, er, goes to the Mafia. | 0:30:25 | 0:30:29 | |
800 businesses have joined Addio Pizzo's anti-extortion campaign. | 0:30:51 | 0:30:56 | |
In the huge task of eradicating the Mafia scourge, | 0:30:56 | 0:31:00 | |
this is a small start, but the potential is revolutionary. | 0:31:00 | 0:31:05 | |
Back in Calabria, the anti-Mafia fight is a generation behind. | 0:31:08 | 0:31:13 | |
In fact, as the state focused on Sicily, | 0:31:13 | 0:31:17 | |
the Ndrangheta grew unchecked. | 0:31:17 | 0:31:19 | |
TRANSLATION: While Cosa Nostra was committed to its strategy of terror, | 0:31:21 | 0:31:25 | |
the Ndrangheta made a completely different choice. | 0:31:25 | 0:31:28 | |
-TRANSLATION: -They were not interested in a war against the state. | 0:31:30 | 0:31:33 | |
They bought the state. Piece by piece. | 0:31:33 | 0:31:36 | |
They seeped into it. | 0:31:36 | 0:31:37 | |
They didn't need to fight it. | 0:31:37 | 0:31:40 | |
Ndrangheta remained in the shadows, | 0:31:43 | 0:31:45 | |
and in the shadows it grew in strength, power, organisation. | 0:31:45 | 0:31:50 | |
And above all, in wealth. | 0:31:50 | 0:31:53 | |
The Calabrian Mafia thrived on neglect, unknown to the world. | 0:31:56 | 0:32:02 | |
Even most Italians struggle to pronounce its name. | 0:32:02 | 0:32:06 | |
Until one night in 2007. | 0:32:06 | 0:32:09 | |
On the 15th August, | 0:32:10 | 0:32:12 | |
a frantic call was received in a small village in Calabria. | 0:32:12 | 0:32:16 | |
A distraught caller asked for "The Mamma"... | 0:32:20 | 0:32:23 | |
..codename for a notorious Ndrangheta boss. | 0:32:25 | 0:32:28 | |
PHONE LINE DISCONNECTS | 0:32:54 | 0:32:56 | |
This dramatic call was not made from Calabria. | 0:32:56 | 0:32:59 | |
Not even from Italy. | 0:32:59 | 0:33:01 | |
It came from 1,000 miles away. | 0:33:01 | 0:33:03 | |
From the German city of Duisburg. | 0:33:06 | 0:33:09 | |
-TRANSLATION: -They'd likely never seen anything like this in Germany. | 0:33:15 | 0:33:19 | |
At the scene, there were two cars. | 0:33:21 | 0:33:24 | |
Bodies splayed out, | 0:33:24 | 0:33:25 | |
the acrid smell of cordite that we are so used to here. | 0:33:25 | 0:33:29 | |
Blood running on the street. | 0:33:29 | 0:33:32 | |
This is a German street. | 0:33:32 | 0:33:34 | |
Clean, orderly, it's not the woods of Aspromonte. | 0:33:34 | 0:33:39 | |
Six men were murdered that night. | 0:33:40 | 0:33:43 | |
In the pocket of one of the victims, | 0:33:44 | 0:33:46 | |
baffled German police found a mysterious charred image. | 0:33:46 | 0:33:49 | |
Looking inside the pockets of those boys, | 0:33:52 | 0:33:54 | |
they found an image of St Michael the Archangel, | 0:33:54 | 0:33:57 | |
with a burnt hole in the centre. | 0:33:57 | 0:33:59 | |
That's what's used in the initiation ceremony | 0:33:59 | 0:34:02 | |
for young Ndrangheta members. | 0:34:02 | 0:34:05 | |
That was the business card of the Ndrangheta. | 0:34:05 | 0:34:07 | |
The dead men were Calabrian gangsters | 0:34:10 | 0:34:12 | |
investing their criminal profits in German hotels and restaurants. | 0:34:12 | 0:34:16 | |
But their murders were the result of a bloody feud back in Calabria. | 0:34:16 | 0:34:21 | |
For the world it was like a slap in the face. | 0:34:24 | 0:34:26 | |
What on earth is happening? | 0:34:26 | 0:34:28 | |
Where do these people come from? Who are they? | 0:34:28 | 0:34:32 | |
What is the Ndrangheta? | 0:34:32 | 0:34:35 | |
The killings stunned the Italian state into action. | 0:34:35 | 0:34:38 | |
Seasoned anti-Mafia investigators were recruited to lead a crackdown. | 0:34:40 | 0:34:44 | |
TRANSLATION: The Duisburg incident revealed | 0:34:48 | 0:34:51 | |
how dangerous Ndrangheta was. | 0:34:51 | 0:34:52 | |
And that made the state realise even more that it needed to act strongly | 0:34:52 | 0:34:56 | |
and decisively. And so it did. | 0:34:56 | 0:34:59 | |
Within months, police rounded up the foot soldiers of the feuding clans. | 0:35:02 | 0:35:06 | |
Grazie. Grazie. | 0:35:08 | 0:35:09 | |
But a key boss remained at large, | 0:35:09 | 0:35:11 | |
the ruthless, violent man nicknamed, "The Mamma". | 0:35:11 | 0:35:15 | |
TRANSLATION: When listening to the phone tabs, | 0:35:21 | 0:35:24 | |
we heard reference to "The Mamma". | 0:35:24 | 0:35:25 | |
We knew it was their codename for Antonio Pelle. | 0:35:25 | 0:35:28 | |
That's what he was known as. | 0:35:28 | 0:35:31 | |
But the hunt for Antonio Pelle | 0:35:32 | 0:35:34 | |
was to demonstrate just what investigators were up against. | 0:35:34 | 0:35:37 | |
In Calabria, fugitive bosses usually hide within their own communities, | 0:35:39 | 0:35:43 | |
protected by a wall of silence. | 0:35:43 | 0:35:45 | |
It was more than a year before a heavily armed squad | 0:35:48 | 0:35:51 | |
swooped on a deserted warehouse | 0:35:51 | 0:35:54 | |
just outside Pelle's home town. | 0:35:54 | 0:35:57 | |
Nothing suggested there might be a bunker or anything like that, | 0:36:01 | 0:36:05 | |
Until we noticed something about part of the floor | 0:36:05 | 0:36:08 | |
that made us suspicious. | 0:36:08 | 0:36:10 | |
Suddenly we see this platform coming up from the floor. | 0:36:17 | 0:36:21 | |
And then we hear the fugitive's voice from below. | 0:36:33 | 0:36:37 | |
Antonio Pelle. | 0:36:41 | 0:36:42 | |
Below the hydraulic lift, | 0:37:03 | 0:37:05 | |
police found a fully furnished living space. | 0:37:05 | 0:37:08 | |
TRANSLATION: The bunker was perfectly organised, like a flat. | 0:37:12 | 0:37:16 | |
It was one of the most sophisticated ever found in Calabria. | 0:37:19 | 0:37:22 | |
He even had a greenhouse to grow cannabis. | 0:37:27 | 0:37:31 | |
So his hobby, too, was taken care of. | 0:37:31 | 0:37:33 | |
The capture of Antonio Pelle was a major coup. | 0:37:39 | 0:37:43 | |
But when, two years later, | 0:37:43 | 0:37:45 | |
he mysteriously managed to escape from custody, | 0:37:45 | 0:37:48 | |
it became clear just how fragile | 0:37:48 | 0:37:50 | |
any victory against the Ndrangheta can be. | 0:37:50 | 0:37:53 | |
Scouring the mountainsides for fugitive bosses is important. | 0:38:02 | 0:38:06 | |
But to really attack the Ndrangheta, investigators needed to penetrate | 0:38:11 | 0:38:16 | |
the deepest secrets of its structure. | 0:38:16 | 0:38:18 | |
In 2009, they made a historic breakthrough. | 0:38:23 | 0:38:28 | |
It came in a secluded valley... | 0:38:28 | 0:38:29 | |
..at Polsi, | 0:38:32 | 0:38:34 | |
home to one of the oldest shrines in Italy. | 0:38:34 | 0:38:37 | |
BELL TOLLS | 0:38:37 | 0:38:40 | |
The Madonna of Polsi. | 0:38:48 | 0:38:50 | |
An object of religious veneration for centuries, a whole host | 0:38:50 | 0:38:53 | |
of miracles have been attributed to this statue. | 0:38:53 | 0:38:57 | |
Every year, a smaller wooden copy gets carried around the sanctuary | 0:38:57 | 0:39:01 | |
here in procession, while women bellow ancient hymns | 0:39:01 | 0:39:05 | |
and the crowd shouts, "Viva, Maria". | 0:39:05 | 0:39:07 | |
This is one of the holiest places in Southern Italy, but it's also | 0:39:09 | 0:39:12 | |
a place with a very sinister history. | 0:39:12 | 0:39:16 | |
Thousands of believers come to this shrine every summer. | 0:39:20 | 0:39:23 | |
It was long suspected that Mafiosi used the pilgrimage as cover, | 0:39:27 | 0:39:31 | |
but for what? | 0:39:31 | 0:39:33 | |
Then, in 2009, | 0:39:33 | 0:39:35 | |
undercover agents spotted a very different kind of pilgrim. | 0:39:35 | 0:39:40 | |
It's just about here on 2nd of September, 2009, | 0:39:42 | 0:39:47 | |
that some of the top bosses in the Ndrangheta was standing | 0:39:47 | 0:39:50 | |
in a circle, as Ndrangheta tradition dictates, | 0:39:50 | 0:39:54 | |
having their secret meeting. | 0:39:54 | 0:39:57 | |
Little did they know that the Carabinieri were filming them. | 0:39:57 | 0:40:00 | |
The men spoke in a quasi-religious code. | 0:40:02 | 0:40:05 | |
TRANSLATION: The scene we witnessed in Polsi | 0:40:22 | 0:40:25 | |
harks back to ancient rituals and mysticism. | 0:40:25 | 0:40:27 | |
But really it has little to do with religion and more to do with crime. | 0:40:27 | 0:40:33 | |
Investigators had filmed a scene that surpassed Hollywood fiction. | 0:40:36 | 0:40:40 | |
The highest body of the Ndrangheta. | 0:40:40 | 0:40:44 | |
In full session. | 0:40:44 | 0:40:47 | |
This previously unknown ruling council had a name. | 0:40:53 | 0:40:57 | |
Il Crimine, "the crime". | 0:40:57 | 0:40:59 | |
TRANSLATION: The Ndrangheta was believed to be | 0:41:07 | 0:41:09 | |
a family-based organisation, with lots of families. | 0:41:09 | 0:41:12 | |
Some more, some less organised, | 0:41:12 | 0:41:14 | |
clashing with each other, making alliances... | 0:41:14 | 0:41:18 | |
Instead, a new structure emerged. Hierarchical and pyramid-like. | 0:41:21 | 0:41:26 | |
Similar to the Sicilian Mafia. | 0:41:26 | 0:41:28 | |
With a provincial executive deciding the criminal strategy. | 0:41:28 | 0:41:32 | |
Not only here in Reggio Calabria, but also in Italy, | 0:41:32 | 0:41:35 | |
Europe and around the world. | 0:41:35 | 0:41:39 | |
What months of investigation revealed | 0:41:39 | 0:41:41 | |
was a global Mafia federation, | 0:41:41 | 0:41:44 | |
with an annual turnover estimated at 44 billion euros. | 0:41:44 | 0:41:49 | |
If accurate, that figure would be the equivalent | 0:41:49 | 0:41:52 | |
of 3% of Italy's entire economic output. | 0:41:52 | 0:41:57 | |
The state offensive also revealed the extraordinary lengths | 0:42:02 | 0:42:05 | |
that Ndrangheta bosses will go to protect their power. | 0:42:05 | 0:42:09 | |
To evade capture and continue to operate, | 0:42:09 | 0:42:13 | |
they've built hundreds of bunkers. | 0:42:13 | 0:42:15 | |
Many are ingeniously concealed beneath water tanks. | 0:42:20 | 0:42:25 | |
Behind radiators. | 0:42:25 | 0:42:28 | |
Wine racks. | 0:42:28 | 0:42:30 | |
Or apparently solid walls. | 0:42:31 | 0:42:34 | |
The elite unit known as the Cacciatore, | 0:42:34 | 0:42:37 | |
or "hunters", were keen to show me one of their particular favourites. | 0:42:37 | 0:42:42 | |
And this has never cooked a single margarita in its life. | 0:43:08 | 0:43:12 | |
And that was one of the clues that told the Cacciatore | 0:43:12 | 0:43:16 | |
that there was something fishy about this particular oven. | 0:43:16 | 0:43:20 | |
A door inside the oven slides back on tracks, | 0:43:29 | 0:43:34 | |
revealing a 30-metre corridor dug deep | 0:43:34 | 0:43:36 | |
into the hillside behind the house. | 0:43:36 | 0:43:39 | |
Holy moley. | 0:43:50 | 0:43:53 | |
This was once a rather nice bedroom suite | 0:43:53 | 0:43:57 | |
complete with mirrors, stereo, TV, | 0:43:57 | 0:44:03 | |
bedroom furniture, heater... | 0:44:03 | 0:44:06 | |
This was clearly a perfectly decent living space once upon a time. | 0:44:06 | 0:44:12 | |
So we've come through the pizza oven down the tunnel, | 0:44:15 | 0:44:20 | |
through the bedroom, into the bathroom | 0:44:20 | 0:44:24 | |
and there's another secret entrance here leading, who knows where. | 0:44:24 | 0:44:29 | |
Here there are tunnels, leading to bunkers, | 0:44:29 | 0:44:32 | |
leading to more tunnels, leading to more bunkers. | 0:44:32 | 0:44:36 | |
There's a kind of madness at work here. | 0:44:36 | 0:44:39 | |
The Ndrangheta has also dug itself deep into Calabrian society. | 0:44:57 | 0:45:02 | |
And to do that, it draws on more than just violence and intimidation. | 0:45:02 | 0:45:06 | |
Bribery, corruption and political patronage | 0:45:06 | 0:45:10 | |
have won some key players over to the Ndrangheta's side. | 0:45:10 | 0:45:14 | |
TRANSLATION: Unfortunately the characteristic of the Ndrangheta | 0:45:18 | 0:45:21 | |
is that it's not only a criminal power, | 0:45:21 | 0:45:23 | |
it also penetrates all layers of social and professional life. | 0:45:23 | 0:45:27 | |
-TRANSLATION: -It's the collusion with politics, institutions | 0:45:30 | 0:45:33 | |
and the business world, that's what strengthens the organisation. | 0:45:33 | 0:45:37 | |
TRANSLATION: Power to buy people, power to offer someone a job, | 0:45:40 | 0:45:44 | |
power to buy an official, a magistrate, a police officer. | 0:45:44 | 0:45:48 | |
This is what money does. | 0:45:48 | 0:45:50 | |
Calabria's institutions have been profoundly infiltrated. | 0:45:53 | 0:45:56 | |
In 2012, the city council of Reggio Calabria | 0:45:56 | 0:46:00 | |
was suspended by Italy's national government. | 0:46:00 | 0:46:04 | |
The reason? Links to organised crime. | 0:46:04 | 0:46:08 | |
The rise of the Pesce clan and its young boss, Ciccio, | 0:46:08 | 0:46:11 | |
is a typical tale of Mafia power. | 0:46:11 | 0:46:14 | |
TRANSLATION: Since we were kids, we've been taught | 0:46:16 | 0:46:18 | |
that every man has his price. Ciccio Pesce was like the mayor. | 0:46:18 | 0:46:23 | |
By 2010, investigators had amassed enough evidence | 0:46:23 | 0:46:27 | |
to put Ciccio Pesce on trial, and raided his hilltop mansion. | 0:46:27 | 0:46:32 | |
Here, too, they found a bunker. | 0:46:35 | 0:46:38 | |
But of the boss himself, hardly any trace. | 0:46:38 | 0:46:42 | |
It was evidence that the gangsters hold the real power in the region. | 0:46:42 | 0:46:47 | |
TRANSLATION: If we don't catch a fugitive | 0:46:49 | 0:46:51 | |
it is because the state has failed. | 0:46:51 | 0:46:54 | |
And people can't quite comprehend why some fugitives | 0:46:54 | 0:46:57 | |
can be on the run for so long. | 0:46:57 | 0:46:59 | |
Catching Ciccio Pesce became an absolute priority. | 0:47:01 | 0:47:06 | |
A special Carabinieri team began looking for a lead, | 0:47:06 | 0:47:10 | |
and for a bunker. | 0:47:10 | 0:47:11 | |
They concentrated on what they knew Ciccio Pesce could not live without. | 0:47:11 | 0:47:17 | |
TRANSLATION: Football and beautiful women, | 0:47:19 | 0:47:21 | |
it was difficult for him to bring a football pitch inside a bunker, | 0:47:21 | 0:47:24 | |
but a woman would definitely have been easier. | 0:47:24 | 0:47:28 | |
And so we concentrated on one woman in particular. | 0:47:28 | 0:47:31 | |
This girl was different from all the others, | 0:47:37 | 0:47:40 | |
because she had a lifestyle that didn't match her means. | 0:47:40 | 0:47:43 | |
So the boyfriend must have been rich, but we didn't see one. | 0:47:49 | 0:47:53 | |
She took too much care of herself to be a single woman. | 0:47:53 | 0:47:56 | |
We studied her habits, we began to follow her day and night. | 0:47:56 | 0:48:00 | |
For months, surveillance was trained | 0:48:04 | 0:48:06 | |
on Ciccio Pesce's suspected mistress. | 0:48:06 | 0:48:09 | |
Until one day, there was a breakthrough. | 0:48:09 | 0:48:12 | |
A car turned up outside the woman's house. | 0:48:12 | 0:48:18 | |
TRANSLATION: We recognised the driver, | 0:48:18 | 0:48:20 | |
he was the armourer of the Pesce clan, | 0:48:20 | 0:48:22 | |
a man in contact with Ciccio Pesce. | 0:48:22 | 0:48:26 | |
The investigators thought this man could be carrying messages | 0:48:26 | 0:48:30 | |
between Pesce and his mistress. | 0:48:30 | 0:48:32 | |
They tracked him to an isolated scrap yard, | 0:48:34 | 0:48:37 | |
a couple of miles outside Rosarno. | 0:48:37 | 0:48:40 | |
TRANSLATION: Surveillance was difficult in this area, | 0:48:45 | 0:48:47 | |
because there was no cover. | 0:48:47 | 0:48:50 | |
It was impossible to go right up there | 0:48:50 | 0:48:52 | |
and get a close look without being seen. | 0:48:52 | 0:48:55 | |
This was a big problem for us. | 0:48:55 | 0:48:58 | |
Faced with such difficulties on the ground, | 0:48:59 | 0:49:02 | |
those hunting the Ndrangheta bosses can now call on help from above. | 0:49:02 | 0:49:08 | |
These observation windows are absolutely amazing, | 0:49:16 | 0:49:19 | |
you can stick your head literally out of the fuselage of the aircraft | 0:49:19 | 0:49:23 | |
and look straight down. | 0:49:23 | 0:49:26 | |
The Italian Government has invested millions | 0:49:26 | 0:49:28 | |
in state-of-the-art spy planes like this one. | 0:49:28 | 0:49:32 | |
We're at something like 2,500 feet at the moment | 0:50:25 | 0:50:28 | |
and when they do these extraordinary zooms, | 0:50:28 | 0:50:31 | |
they tell me that even from several kilometres away, | 0:50:31 | 0:50:35 | |
they can identify the number plate on a car. | 0:50:35 | 0:50:38 | |
Investigators were trawling through all conceivable evidence | 0:50:57 | 0:51:01 | |
about the scrap yard, suspected of being Pesce's lair. | 0:51:01 | 0:51:07 | |
TRANSLATION: And so we began to get hold of satellite images | 0:51:07 | 0:51:10 | |
of the previous two year period. | 0:51:10 | 0:51:13 | |
We were looking to identify structural changes made to the area. | 0:51:13 | 0:51:19 | |
And then we got lucky. | 0:51:21 | 0:51:25 | |
The presence of a bulldozer, wooden boards to spread mortar, | 0:51:25 | 0:51:29 | |
heaps of cement mix, sand, the cement mixer... | 0:51:29 | 0:51:33 | |
The photo showed that six months earlier, builders had been at work, | 0:51:33 | 0:51:38 | |
but there was no evidence of any new buildings. | 0:51:38 | 0:51:41 | |
At least not ABOVE ground. | 0:51:41 | 0:51:43 | |
In fact, as the Carabinieri entered | 0:52:24 | 0:52:26 | |
and searched every inch of the compound, | 0:52:26 | 0:52:29 | |
secret cameras were trained on THEM. | 0:52:29 | 0:52:32 | |
The owner of the compound finally appeared | 0:52:32 | 0:52:35 | |
and reluctantly led Lumia and his men to a chicken coup. | 0:52:35 | 0:52:39 | |
A few moments later, the trapdoor opens. | 0:52:46 | 0:52:49 | |
TRANSLATION: He comes out and he's white, like a corpse. | 0:52:53 | 0:52:56 | |
He's lost 15 kilos. | 0:52:56 | 0:52:59 | |
But we had recognised his voice when he'd shouted from the tomb | 0:52:59 | 0:53:02 | |
in which he'd buried himself for months. | 0:53:02 | 0:53:04 | |
We'd got him. | 0:53:05 | 0:53:08 | |
The hunt for one of Italy's most dangerous men was over. | 0:53:15 | 0:53:19 | |
The bunker had been Pesce's command centre for months. | 0:53:43 | 0:53:47 | |
Through a dozen CCTV cameras, he watched his hunters closing in. | 0:53:51 | 0:53:56 | |
That gave him just enough time to destroy any incriminating evidence. | 0:53:56 | 0:54:00 | |
Pesce has begun a 20-year prison sentence. | 0:54:27 | 0:54:30 | |
Now the Italian state is putting 64 alleged members | 0:54:30 | 0:54:34 | |
of his clan on trial. | 0:54:34 | 0:54:37 | |
Ironically, they're being tried in a so called bunker courtroom, | 0:54:37 | 0:54:41 | |
bomb-proof and several metres underground. | 0:54:41 | 0:54:45 | |
This is one of the first major trials against the Ndrangheta | 0:54:52 | 0:54:55 | |
since its secret structure was revealed. | 0:54:55 | 0:54:58 | |
The state is trying to show that it can fight the Mafia and win. | 0:54:58 | 0:55:03 | |
The stakes are high and not only for Italy. | 0:55:03 | 0:55:07 | |
TRANSLATION: Ndrangheta clones its own criminal structure, multiplies it | 0:55:09 | 0:55:13 | |
and plants itself in new territories. | 0:55:13 | 0:55:16 | |
In Canada, Australia, Switzerland, Germany. | 0:55:18 | 0:55:22 | |
There is no bit of territory, no social category which is immune | 0:55:25 | 0:55:31 | |
from the possibility of contagion by the Ndrangheta, by the Mafia. | 0:55:31 | 0:55:37 | |
There isn't any. | 0:55:37 | 0:55:39 | |
But even the vast resources being poured into the fight | 0:55:39 | 0:55:43 | |
against the Ndrangheta can only begin to tackle the problem. | 0:55:43 | 0:55:48 | |
TRANSLATION: We can arrest 100, 200, 300 | 0:55:48 | 0:55:52 | |
but there will always be offspring ready to take the reins of the clan. | 0:55:52 | 0:55:56 | |
Until Calabrian society stops shaking the hand of the Mafioso, | 0:55:58 | 0:56:03 | |
pretending not to know he is a Mafioso. | 0:56:03 | 0:56:06 | |
Until that happens, there's no chance of uprooting the weed. | 0:56:06 | 0:56:11 | |
-TRANSLATION: -The battle in Calabria is still tough. | 0:56:15 | 0:56:20 | |
It's still difficult. | 0:56:20 | 0:56:22 | |
In Sicily, it took years of fighting to get results. | 0:56:22 | 0:56:25 | |
Public opinion, the people must be reassured the state is strong. | 0:56:25 | 0:56:29 | |
Credible and in charge. | 0:56:29 | 0:56:32 | |
In Calabria, the road is still long. | 0:56:32 | 0:56:36 | |
It's more than ten years since businessman Gaetano Saffioti | 0:56:38 | 0:56:42 | |
took his brave stand and defied the Ndrangheta. | 0:56:42 | 0:56:46 | |
He is still a pariah and a prisoner in his own community. | 0:56:46 | 0:56:52 | |
TRANSLATION: Here WE are in a kind of bunker. | 0:56:52 | 0:56:56 | |
It's the price you have to pay. | 0:56:56 | 0:56:59 | |
I pay this willingly for what I set out to achieve. | 0:56:59 | 0:57:05 | |
But only when there are many of us, | 0:57:05 | 0:57:07 | |
then I'll be able to call myself completely free. | 0:57:07 | 0:57:10 | |
Free to walk around like everyone else, to go for a ride on my bike. | 0:57:10 | 0:57:15 | |
To go to the beach, to watch the sea and swim. | 0:57:15 | 0:57:19 | |
All these things that normal people do, but I'm prevented from doing. | 0:57:19 | 0:57:24 | |
Sooner or later, it will happen. | 0:57:24 | 0:57:27 | |
We need more time, but it will happen. | 0:57:27 | 0:57:31 | |
I'm sure of it. | 0:57:31 | 0:57:33 | |
What I've seen in Calabria are scenes from a war, | 0:57:52 | 0:57:57 | |
a war that the rest of the world doesn't even know is going on. | 0:57:57 | 0:58:01 | |
The tragedy of this land is that it took so long | 0:58:01 | 0:58:04 | |
for the Italian state to begin a serious fight back. | 0:58:04 | 0:58:08 | |
But having seen what I've seen on this journey, I have a hope, | 0:58:08 | 0:58:14 | |
a belief, that the tide of history has finally begun to turn. | 0:58:14 | 0:58:20 | |
Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd | 0:58:30 | 0:58:34 |