The allegedly Camorra
mafia-linked politician Nicola Cosentino, a former
undersecretary to three-time premier Silvio Berlusconi, was "our
thing" said a Camorra informant in a Caserta courtroom on
Wednesday.
In a judicial meeting, Camorra clan member and informant
Roberto Vargas described Cosentino as "cosa nostra" (our thing),
a reference to Mafia membership and said that the politician had
met with Casalesi head Francesco "Sandokan" Schiavone to talk
about contracts and politics.
"Cosentino met with Sandokan after his release in 1993 and
before the Spartacus raid (1995). The two met in the warehouse
annex of Vicenzo Cantiello's shoe shop. (Cantiello is a relative
of boss Salvatore Cantiello). Cantiello told this in 2003 after
he left his cell. Then in the course of the years, Nicola
Schiavone (son of Sandokan) told me many times that Cosentino
was 'cosa nostra'", said Vargas.
Vargas also said that Cosentino took care of the bribes to
companies building the Sparanise power station near Caserta.
"Nicola Schiavone told me that we should not do anything
because Cosentino had closed the deal with a bribe of 20
thousand euro each month, delivered into the hands of the
cashier of the Nicolino Panaro clan".
Cosentino was arrested in April along with 12 others for
alleged extortion and unfair competition in favor of his family
petrol-pump business in the southern Campania region
Also on his rap sheet is a March 2013 arrest on suspicion
of collusion with the Neapolitan mafia for alleged links with
the powerful Casalesi clan whose death threats have forced
anti-mafia writer Roberto Saviano into 24-hour police
protection.
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