VIBO VALENTIA First the theft from the Messina breeder, then the blockade by the police, then the new “snatch” for the judges attributable to the Zungri boss Peppone Accorinti. It is the curious odyssey of some cattle, told among Rinascita Scott’s reasons for the abbreviated sentence of Pantaleone Nicolino Mazzeo, believed to be an associate of the Zungri club and, in this case, a participant in the theft of the “sacred cows”. For him the Court of Appeal of Catanzaro confirmed the 14-year sentence, rejecting the defenders’ appeal. Among the charges, the one dedicated to the mafia association holds. For the judges Mazzeo can be considered «among the historical affiliates of the Accorinti gang of Zungri», as demonstrated by the fact that he was the victim of some ambushes and shootings during the period of the feud against the Soriano family. Mazzeo would also have participated in a theft of cattle after the intervention of the police.
The sacred cows and the denunciation in 2016
The practice of sacred cows to impose power and appropriate land is now consolidated among the ‘Ndrangheta. A phenomenon that is especially relevant in Zungri, in the Vibonese area, where the alleged boss Peppone Accorinti would even have fun, according to what the justice witness said Elizabeth Melana, to see cattle wandering on other people’s land. “He laughs when he knows about the damage,” she told investigators. But, in this context, there are also those who have tried to report. This is the case of a farmer who in 2016 requested the intervention of ASP and the police after the discovery of cattle on the land he owned. After checks, the authorities managed to trace the original owner: a breeder from Messina who had reported its loss or, as specified by the judges of the Supreme Court who had handled the case in the precautionary phase «more precisely the theft, considering the notorious inability of cattle to cross the Strait independently and by swimming».
The reconstruction of the theft
It is the Supreme Court, in dealing with the request of the defenders in the precautionary phase to deem the criminal case “non-existent” (later accepted), which tries to reconstruct the odyssey of the cattle. Stolen for the first time from the Messina breeder, these would have reached Zungri in the hands of Peppone Accorinti. After the farmer reported it to the ASP, the cattle were left in the custody of the farmer, unable to return to their rightful owner due to the absence of health checks. Precisely this news would have put “in fibrillation, first of all, the members of the family” of Peppone Accorinti. Hence the idea of a new theft: It was November 8, 2016 when the farmer reported the disappearance of the cattle he had tied on his land. «It is important to underline – the judges write on appeal – how it emerged that the cattle, after the theft, were taken right inside the “Pagliaio”» owned by Pantaleone Nicolino Mazzeo.
Two different positions of the judges
On the case of the “stolen” cattle, the judges of appeal and of the Supreme Court expressed themselves differently twice. In particular, the “stoats” believed there were no “objective conditions for the crime of theft”. Missing would be precisely the “dispossession”: the cattle had already been stolen «at an unspecified time» from the Messina breeder, consequently the second theft would be «a criminally irrelevant post factum» compared to the first. Once Peppone Accorinti came into possession, as there was no new owner there would not have been a second theft. Conclusion not shared by the judges of the Court of Appeal that, given the intervention of the civil authorities and the health restriction imposed by the ASP, “the possession of Accorinti was interrupted” even if only for two days. The reappropriation, which apparently occurred thanks to the help of Nicolino Mazzeo and his associates, according to the appeal judges «integrated the crime of theft, since Accorinti was not the legitimate owner». In short, a real “theft within the theft” which led to the 14-year sentence of Pantaleone Nicolino Mazzeo. (Ma.Ru.)
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