© Associated Press
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The release from prison of one of the most notorious mobsters, who has become a police informant, has sparked even more outrage, even after an old prison interview was broadcast in which he apologized to his many victims for the role. , who played in “this death factory,” the Associated Press reported.
Sixty-four-year-old Giovanni Brusca was released from prison this week after serving 25 years of his life sentence for some of Cosa Nostra’s most heinous crimes. These include the 1992 bombing of a leading Italian prosecutor investigating the Mafia, and the abduction and murder in 1996 of the 11-year-old son of a man who had betrayed the Mafia. The strangled boy’s body was placed in an acid bath.
Brusca is said to have admitted involvement in nearly 150 murders as the right-hand man of Cosa Nostra Salvatore’s “boss boss” Toto Riina, who died in prison in 2017.
Given the seriousness of the crimes committed by Brusca, his early release outraged many Italians and sparked calls for legislative reform that allows for reduced sentences for mobsters who violate the mafia’s “omerta,” or vow of silence, and cooperate with investigators. However, others, such as the sister of the slain prosecutor, are defending the procedure as a necessary way to persuade mobsters to co-operate with the judiciary, the AP notes.
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