Italian police launched sweeping raids on Friday in a vast anti-mafia operation targeting around 100 people including top organised crime bosses accused of extortion, drug trafficking and murder.
In “one of the largest operations ever carried out” in Rome, the blitz struck “a deadly blow to the mafia cell which had been operating in the capital for years,” the police said.
Amid accusations of drug trafficking, usury, extortion and control of the slot machine market, 51 people who helped lead “illegal activities” in Rome and the suburb of Ostia were served with arrest warrants, police spokesman Mario Viola said.
A second operation targeted members of the immensely powerful ‘Ndrangheta criminal organisation in the city of Catanzaro in the southern region of Calabria, Viola said.
The arrest warrants concerned 50 to 70 people, “including entrepreneurs, politicians and lawyers”, he said.
Some 500 police officers took part in the Rome raids – along with a helicopter, dog units and maritime police – which aimed in particular to root out members of the Sicilian mafia who have infiltrated the capital, buying up bars and restaurants as fronts for criminal activities.