Judges From Italy

"We followed Falcone closely; he was feared and admired by the mafia. He had the courage of his convictions. He was different from everyone else."

"[During the commemoration of Falcone in the main hall of the Palace of Justice in Milan] You killed Giovanni Falcone. With your indifference. With your criticism... You slandered him. You distrusted him. And now some of you even have the nerve to attend his funeral."

"Giovanni was prevented from conducting mafia trials in his city. So he chose the only possible route, the Ministry of Justice, to ensure that his project would be realized: a unified structure against the mafia. And it was a revolution."

"The awareness is slowly gaining ground that the regulation of the functions and careers of public prosecutors cannot be identical to that of judges, as their functions are different and, therefore, so are the aptitudes, mental habits, and professional skills required to perform such different tasks: the public prosecutor is an investigator in all respects, while the judge is the arbiter of the dispute. We must move in this direction, setting aside the specter of the prosecutor's dependence on the executive and the discretion of criminal prosecution, which is regularly touted whenever the differentiation of careers is discussed. To deny the specificity of prosecutorial functions as opposed to judicial ones, in an anachronistic attempt to continue to consider the judiciary as a single entity, paradoxically amounts to guaranteeing less independence and autonomy for the judiciary itself."

"It pains me to say this, but if the institutions continue their short-sighted policy towards the mafia, I fear that their absolute lack of prestige in the lands where organized crime thrives will only further favor Cosa Nostra."

"I fear that the judiciary will return to its old routine: mafiosi doing their job on one side, magistrates doing theirs more or less well on the other, and, when all is said and done, the palpable inefficiency of the State."

"People generally die because they are alone or because they have entered into a game that is too big. They often die because they do not have the necessary alliances, because they lack support. In Sicily, the Mafia strikes at the servants of the State whom the latter has failed to protect."

"We can always do something: a maxim that should be carved on the bench of every magistrate and every police officer."

"For twenty years, Italy was ruled by a Fascist regime in which all democratic debate was abolished. Subsequently, a single party, the Christian Democrats, monopolized power, especially in Sicily, albeit with occasional allies, from the day of Liberation onwards. For its part, the opposition, even in the fight against the mafia, has not always proved equal to the task, confusing the political struggle against Christian Democracy with the judicial proceedings against Cosa Nostra affiliates, or feeding on prejudices: “Nothing can be done against the mafia as long as this government with these men is in power.”"

"Why do I recall this episode? Because it demonstrates once again how skilled, determined, and intelligent mafiosi are, and how much ability and professionalism is needed to combat mafia violence. My great concern is that the mafia always manages to maintain an advantage over us."

"In moments of melancholy, I allow myself to think about the fate of men of honor: why are men like any other, some with genuine intellectual qualities, forced to invent a criminal activity in order to survive with dignity? (chap. II)"

"The same mechanism of expulsion, in practice, is found among the Eskimos and other peoples who abandon the elderly, the seriously ill, and the wounded because they hinder their progress in a hostile land, endangering the survival of all. In a group such as the Mafia, which must defend itself from enemies, those who are weak or sick must be eliminated."

"The mafia, I repeat once again, is not a cancer that has proliferated by chance on healthy tissue. It lives in perfect symbiosis with the myriad of protectors, accomplices, informants, debtors of all kinds, big and small masters, intimidated or blackmailed people who belong to all strata of society. This is the breeding ground for the Mafia, with all that this entails in terms of direct or indirect implications, conscious or not, voluntary or forced, which often enjoy the consent of the population."

"The realistic picture of the State's commitment to fighting organized crime. Emotional, episodic, fluctuating. Motivated only by the impression made by a particular crime or the effect that a particular government initiative may have on public opinion."

"Joining the Mafia is like converting to a religion. You never stop being a priest. Or a Mafioso."

"I believe that the Mafia is involved in all the important events in Sicilian life, starting with the Allied landing in Sicily during World War II and the appointment of Mafia mayors after the Liberation. I do not presume to venture into political analysis, but I will not be made to believe that certain political groups are not allied with Cosa Nostra—due to an obvious convergence of interests—in an attempt to influence our still immature democracy by eliminating figures who are inconvenient for both. (p. 170)"

"Of course, we will still have to deal with organized crime of a mafia nature for a long time to come. For a long time, but not forever: because the mafia is a human phenomenon and, like all human phenomena, it has a beginning, an evolution, and therefore it will also have an end."

"It is difficult to dispute that mafia organizations (the Sicily Cosa Nostra and the Calabria Ndrangheta) are probably much more closely linked than is officially acknowledged, and that they not only have a thorough understanding of how the State apparatus works, but also have no qualms about targeting anyone they deem appropriate."

"(About Antonio Agostino) I owe my life to that boy."

"This is the happy country where, if someone plants a bomb under your house and it doesn't explode, it's your fault for not detonating it."

"Interviewer: But why would they do that? Giovani Falcone: Only the spirit of service."

"Orlando now needs the “temperature” to rise even higher. He will be forced to make bigger and bigger claims every day. To achieve this, he and his friends are ready to do anything, even walk over their parents' dead bodies."

"The Mafia is by no means invincible. It is a human phenomenon and, like all human phenomena, it has a beginning and it will also have an end. Rather, we must realize that it is a terribly serious and very grave phenomenon and that it can be defeated not by demanding heroism from defenseless citizens, but by committing all the best forces of the institutions to this battle."

"The mafia [...] has long served as a model for organized crime. It follows that this substantial uniformity of organizational structure allows the term mafia to be used in a broad sense for all major criminal organizations."

"The important thing is not to determine whether one has fear or not, but to know how to live with one's fear and not be influenced by it. That's what courage is, otherwise it's no longer courage, it's recklessness."

"I believe we need to realize that this is not a personal battle between us and the mafia. If we understood that this must be a commitment—extraordinary in its ordinariness—by everyone to combat a phenomenon that is unworthy of a civilized country, things would certainly be much better."

"It's all theater. [Falcone was referring to the sirens blaring and the heavily armed police officers protecting him during his meeting with Spanish writer Juan Arias.] When the Mafia decides to do it, they'll kill me anyway."

"You confuse independence with arbitrariness, that's the problem: those who are independent must always be accountable. Lawyer Alfredo Galasso: “Magistrates are not.” Giovanni Falcone: Oh no? How come? There is a wonderful law on civil liability and you say no?"

"Even in the most heinous of criminals, I must see the man."

"Gian Carlo Caselli, Un magistrato fuori legge, Melampo Editore, 2005. ISBN 888953334X"

"I am the only Italian magistrate to whom Parliament has expressly dedicated a law. A law contra personam that has deprived me of a right: that of competing, on an equal footing with other colleagues, for the position of National Anti-Mafia Prosecutor. Leading figures from the center-right have publicly stated that my exclusion was intended as “compensation” for Senator for Life Giulio Andreotti, whom I had unjustly “persecuted” with the investigation I opened against him when I was Chief Prosecutor in Palermo. The truth has been turned on its head. That investigation, in fact, led to a ruling by the Court of Appeal of Palermo, later confirmed by the Court of Cassation in a definitive and unchangeable manner, which considers the crime of criminal association with the Cosa Nostra to have been “committed” and “concretely recognizable” on the part of the defendant until the spring of 1980. The ruling is not a conviction because it acknowledges that the crime is time-barred, while for the charges after 1980, the senator for life is acquitted on the grounds of insufficient evidence. These are the facts. Yet, a certain political class had no doubt about who should be compensated and who should be punished."

"I can distinguish between right and wrong. In this, I am presumptuous."

"There has been misuse of telephone wiretapping by the judiciary, namely by public prosecutors' offices at the national level."

"Saying that the 'ndrangheta has logistical bases in Lombardy is not a new discovery. It could and should have been said twenty years ago. There are reports by some courageous and far-sighted police officers that seem prophetic. A 1983 report from the Vigevano police station already contained all the information. The police commissioner had understood the mafia system and organization long before our investigations. But the judiciary at the time did not understand those ideas, which were clearly revolutionary for the time. And so, from 1983 to today, a mafia family has been able to grow and increase its criminal capacity."

"[...] the Gomorra series warns us against evil, pushes us against a wall, gives us no excuses (after all, there is the good cop, the anti-Mafia prosecutor, the anti-Mafia priests, etc.), and forces us to look inside ourselves. Saviano (and the authors who wrote the screenplay with him) understood that only by starting from absolute evil, from the absence of good, can the authentic motive for renewal arise. He invites us to look with eyes free from preconceptions and false hypocrisy, namely that the reality of the south, of Naples, of Secondigliano, of Scampia... is also that represented by Gomorra. Urban decay does not originate from the series, it pre-exists. We have been accustomed to seeing the hairstyles of Genny and the other young characters for years, not only in the neighborhoods and districts of Scampia, but also in the North, in America, as well as the actors' clothing: Gomorra reproduces reality, far from any risk of emulation. Depicting evil does not mean smearing the south. On the contrary, the spirit of the series is precisely that, I repeat, to depict evil in all its facets in order to achieve renewal. [...]That's why I'm on the side of Gomorra, which investigates evil in order to overcome it. I am grateful to Saviano for trying, and I am grateful to Stefano Sollima (and the other directors) and the actors who have taken on an immense responsibility and done so with awareness and talent. All of them have shown courage that cannot be taken for granted: they have brought evil to the stage and left it up to us to decide where good lies."

"(About the Silvio Berlusconi prostitution trial) Absurdly, in this situation, the non-EU minor [Ruby] – a person who, I repeat, is intelligent and cunning, with that particular “Eastern” cunning of her origins – exploits, manages to exploit her non-EU status."

"There is a magistrate, a charming red-haired woman who was a friend of Giovanni Falcone, who after the attacks in Capaci and Via D'Amelio went to Sicily and had the perpetrators of the two massacres arrested: Ilda Boccassini. A tenacious woman who stops at nothing, she has a single goal: to ensure that justice prevails, as Judge Falcone did in Palermo in the maxi trial against the Mafia."

"(About the veracity of the two meetings between Giulio Andreotti and Stefano Bontate) The latest denialist performance, rather than talking about innocence in general, focuses on a specific fact: two meetings between the defendant Andreotti and Stefano Bontate (head of the Cosa Nostra mafia) mentioned by Pif in the television series La mafia uccide solo d'estate (The Mafia Only Kills Only in Summer), broadcast every Thursday on Rai1. In Il Foglio on May 12, Maurizio Crippa argues—in summary—that Pif “tramples on the facts” because “it is written in the judgments” and “sealed in the Cassation ruling” that the accusatory statements relating to the two alleged meetings were not "supported by adequate evidence (...) In short, there were no (...) and the Andreotti who met Bontate never existed.“ Too bad for Crippa that the Court of Cassation has ”sealed" a very different truth. On page 169, the Court of Cassation confirms what the Court of Appeal had already established, concluding that Andreotti "had met with the mafiosi; he had interacted with them; he had instructed them on how to behave in relation to the highly sensitive Mattarella issue, even if he ultimately failed to get them to follow his instructions; he had gained their trust to such an extent that they discussed even very serious matters (such as the assassination of President Mattarella) in the confident knowledge that they would not be reported; he had failed to report their responsibilities, particularly in relation to the Mattarella murder, even though he could have provided very useful information in this regard." All this is stated after mentioning on page 156 that there had been two meetings between Andreotti and Bontate “concerning the problem represented by Piersanti Mattarella,” the second of which took place in the spring of 1980 (the date until which the crime attributed to the defendant was recognized as having been committed). At this point, it is difficult to understand how one can deny that the two meetings between Andreotti and Bontate took place, and instead accuse those who mention them of being “slanderers and defamers.” The fact is that the two meetings with Bontate took on considerable probative significance for Andreotti's criminal liability, which was recognized until 1980 by the Court of Appeal and definitively “sealed” by the Court of Cassation. Therefore, denying these meetings is a bit like reiterating without any basis – once again – that Andreotti would have been acquitted."

"When we found ourselves dealing with these characters, or rather, with these problems—because initially these characters did not exist—we knew very little. As time went on, and only as time went on, we began to understand a few things. For example, that a terrorist group can, unfortunately, easily become powerful. In the sense that all it takes is a mixture of certain ingredients: ideological fanaticism, a certain ability to organize, exploiting the myriad opportunities for camouflage offered by a large city, organizing by diversifying tasks between regular and irregular members, organizing by seeking connections with civil society at various levels. These capabilities are enough to be able to strike hard, even with a terrorist group that is not very large in number. All this—we discovered over time—was what the Red Brigades were. All this made the Red Brigades dangerous, especially from a political point of view: it is not so much their military danger—for which, in my opinion, a large number of members is not necessary—as their political danger deriving from their connections, or potential connections, with sectors of civil society and the intellectual world that the BR had at that stage, and which made them a very serious political problem."

"No gang of gangsters has ever lasted more than 20 or 25 years. The mafia has been around for 150 years. How can this be explained? On the one hand, by its control of the territory, the main factor that distinguishes it from common organized crime. On the other hand (and I would say above all), by its “external relations.” That is to say, the intertwining of relationships, business deals, and interests with elements of politics, institutions, public administration, and the economy. I emphasize that these are “elements,” distorted and deviant elements."

"The “fight against the mafia” (everyone knows this, or should know it) cannot be carried out solely through police and judicial repression. Focusing the strategy to combat mafia crime exclusively on technical investigations, and not also on political and cultural aspects, is inevitably doomed to failure in the long run. The actions of the police and magistrates, however methodical, committed, and professional they may be, can only have a profound impact if they are complemented by a “revival” of the social context. Keeping our guard up, mobilizing public opinion, raising awareness, and isolating the mafia culture are absolutely essential complements to investigative action."

"The Mafia is indeed a criminal organization, and it is indeed a problem for the police and public order; but it is not only that. It is a much more complex phenomenon, characterized by a dense network of relationships with civil society and various segments of institutions. This has led to a web of interests and a network of alliances, collusion, and complicity that have always made the mafia a dangerous factor in the possible corruption of politics, the economy, and finance (with all the risks that this entails for the orderly development of a democratic system). It is therefore reductive to consider the mafia as a group of a few hundred violent and ferocious outlaws."

"The solution to the case in question, when referring to the specific nature of the case, has a mandatory path: it must focus on a member of the anti-mafia pool, it must focus on the structure that heads this pool. The pool of magistrates of the Palermo investigation office was able to equip itself (first and foremost culturally), thus creating a new, close-knit structure that spread professionalism. It should not be forgotten that this was an open structure, in the sense that it professionally trained magistrates who, before joining the pool, had never dealt with these issues and who, thanks to the pool, achieved a very high level of competence. Ultimately, by operating in this way, the pool of investigating judges at the Court of Palermo achieved significant results, based on identifying the characteristics of the new mafia. These were the first results after years, decades and decades of substantial impunity. In some speeches, there was talk of rewards, in particular rewards for protagonism, as a criterion not to be followed, and the history of protagonism is a bit like the history of when women wore veils. At that time, all women were beautiful, but when the veil fell, differences began to be noticed. Something similar happened with the judiciary. When judges did not cause any ‘trouble’, when they were not inconvenient, they were all good and beautiful. But when they began to take on a specific role, to show signs of vitality, to demand to exercise control over legality even towards previously unthinkable objectives, that is when the accusation of protagonism began. Meanwhile, those judges who back down (as happened both in Turin during the trial of the historic leaders of the Red Brigades and in Palermo during the recently concluded trial of the Mafia) risk nothing at all, and no one protests or criticizes them. Other speakers have referred to rewards in the sense of a career that would run along “privileged” paths for those judges who have had certain professional experiences. But it is inconceivable, even somewhat scandalous, to speak of privilege in reference to the judges in Palermo, who live in conditions that are well known to all and which, if anything, represent a heavy penalty. In the case of the fight against the Mafia, these interests are the interests of democracy, which makes this second (non-sectoral) view entirely justified. For these reasons, I am opposed to the committee's proposal."

"[On the judicial investigations that led to his removal] I was more upset about the end of another investigation, the one into IRI's slush funds. In the P2 case it was the first time, and I thought it was an accident that could happen. But the next time I was on the verge of resigning."

"Looking back at Mani pulite, one realises, so it happened to me at least, that if one wants to achieve a result one cannot delegate the commitment to others. Instead, in Italy it was, and still is, in my opinion, as if the other powers had told the judiciary 'You take care of it', instead of committing themselves directly to the common good."

"Since the landing of the Allies in Sicily, and the decision to involve the Mafia to facilitate it, a 'quiet life' relationship has been established with this criminal organisation, which has characterised decades of our history. It was a necessarily occult agreement. And even more occult and opaque has necessarily been its perpetuation. What could it have produced if not blackmail? The blackmail of the criminal powers over politics. Another example of that way of governing the country by compromise, and then by blackmail, is the 'Cirillo case'. Remember? A part of the DC came to an agreement with Raffaele Cutolo's Camorra to free councillor Ciro Cirillo, granting, in exchange, the criminality access to the public resources of the post-seismic reconstruction. And I could go on: Iri's slush funds; the P2..."

"The consensus of public opinion was an essential factor in the success of Operation Mani Pulite."

"The P2 also wanted Moro's death because it opened the door to the PCI. And Cossiga was powerless."