Gianfranco Romeo sits at a table at his trattoria off the Pantheon, casting scorn over the idea that he's a frontman for a feared mafia clan.
“I always had a passion for restaurant work, I began as a dishwasher,” Romeo said at Il Barroccio, as pizza-makers prepared to fire up the oven for the evening crowd of tourists.
Romeo is among several people under investigation for suspected false property registration in one of a growing number of investigations in which mobsters are suspected of systematically buying up Roman tourist restaurants to launder cocaine profits, allegedly installing people like Romeo as figurehead owners.
Gianfranco Romeo gives an interview at a table of Il Barroccio restaurant in Rome. The eatery was raided this year as a suspected front for money-laundering operations, something Romeo denies. Photo: AP
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Romeo contended bitterly that investigators were targeting him and others merely because they are natives of Calabria, the southern region that is home to the 'Ndragheta, one of the most feared global crime syndicates. In seizing restaurants from hard-working people like himself, he said, authorities are essentially alleging that all Calabrians in Rome are crooks.
He's looking forward to his day in a court so he can ask prosecutors: “Why do you say I'm a figurehead when I paid with my own money?”
Via dei Pastini, a narrow street thronging with tourists in Rome, has been at the centre of an organised crime investigation this year. Three trattorias on the street have been raided by investigators. Photo: AP
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Prosecutors are confident they'll have the right answer.
