Italy captures most-wanted mafia boss Messina Denaro after 30 years on run
- Messina Denaro, now 60, is the last of three long-time fugitive top-level mafia bosses who had for decades eluded capture
- He is set to be imprisoned for two bombings in Sicily in 1992 that murdered top anti-mafia prosecutors
Italy’s top fugitive, convicted mafia boss Matteo Messina Denaro, was arrested on Monday at a private clinic in Palermo, Sicily after three decades on the run, Italian paramilitary police said.
Messina Denaro was captured at the clinic where he was receiving treatment for an undisclosed medical condition, said Carabinieri General Pasquale Angelosanto, who heads the police force’s special operations squad.
In a police photo showing him sitting in a police van, Messina Denaro was wearing a brown leather jacket and white skull cap and his trademark tinted glasses. His face looked wan. He was taken to a secret location by police immediately after the arrest, Italian state television reported.
A young man when he went into hiding, he is now 60. Messina Denaro, who had a power base in the port city of Trapani, in western Sicily, was considered Sicily’s Cosa Nostra top boss even while a fugitive.
He was the last of three long-time fugitive top-level mafia bosses who had for decades eluded capture.
Messina Denaro, who tried in absentia and convicted of dozens of murders, faces multiple life sentences.