An anti-mafia operation coordinated by the Etna DDA is underway in Vittoria, in the Ragusa area. Gico financiers of the economic and financial police unit of Catania and carabinieri of the investigative unit of the provincial command of Ragusa are carrying out actions against 16 people have been ordered to be held in prison issued by the investigating judge of the Etna capital at the request of the district anti-mafia directorate.
The suspects are accused of various crimes of mafia association, external competition in mafia association, attempted murder, and illicit competition with threat or violence. Twelve people were arrested while precautionary custody orders were issued against four other suspects. The provision of the investigating judge, issued at the request of the Etna DDA, with the deputy prosecutor Sebastiano Ardita and the deputy Gabriele Fragalà, is based on investigations from 2016 to 2023.
Among the recipients of the measure is Emanuele ‘Elio’ Grecoconsidered head of the group, which, when he was detained, was led by Gaetano Valenti, appointed ‘pro tempore contact person’. Greco also commanded from home where he had been under house arrest since 2021, using it as a ‘logistical base’ also for meetings with the leaders of other gangs. According to the Catania DDA, the investigations revealed that the group “would have perpetrated an indeterminate series of crimes against life, individual safety, personal freedom, assets, and acquired, directly or indirectly, the management or in any case the control of economic activities, with particular reference to the production sector and marketing of packaging for fruit and vegetables“. For the Prosecutor’s Office “confirmation of its operations would have revealed links with other mafia groups, including the Santapaola-Ercolano clans of Catania, Nardo di Lentini (Syracuse) and Rinzivill” of Gela (Caltanissetta)”. The group, the Etna district attorney claims, also committed “intimidating actions against Vittoria criminals to pay for drug shipments supplied by other clans” who had turned to them for the “credit recovery“. During the investigations, “critical moments” with “belonging to the group who organized themselves to carry out acts of force with the use of weapons against Vittoria criminals, which, thanks to the timely intervention of the investigators, were resolved without bloodshed“.
