Italian police on
Wednesday caught up with an 'Ndrangheta boss who had escaped
from hospital in 2011.
Antonio Pelle, 54, known as 'Mamma', head of the Calabrian
mafia clan of the same name from the town of San Luca and one of
Italy's 100 most dangerous fugitives, was found in an bunker
under his house in the town of Bovalino.
Pelle, who was about to be listed among Italy's 10 most
dangerous fugitives, had been sentenced to 20 years in jail for
mafia conspiracy and drug and weapons trafficking.
Pelle, who escaped from Locri hospital five years ago, was
head of one of the clans whose feud led to the infamous Duisburg
massacre at Ferragosto 2007.
He had been taken to hospital for a serious form of
anorexia.
Pelle was first arrested in 2008, also in an underground
bunker, which included a small area for growing cannabis.
The boss is believed to have been responsible for the
murder of a member of the rival Strangio family, Maria Strangio,
which revived a long-smouldering vendetta and led to the
shocking bloodshed in the German city of Duisburg.
The six murders in the bustling but peaceful German city on
August 15 2007 put 'Ndrangheta in the global spotlight.
After a Europe-wide manhunt Giovanni Strangio, 32, was
arrested in Amsterdam in March 2009 for leading the massacre.
He was arrested in the Dutch city with another of Italy's
30 most wanted criminals, his brother-in-law Francesco Romeo.
Strangio is believed to have set up and led the massacre
in Duisburg in revenge for the killing of his cousin Maria
Strangio on Christmas Day 2006.
A four-man hit squad from the Calabrian town of San
Luca, home to the feuding clans, is believed to have gunned
down the six members of the rival clan.
Another brother-in-law of Strangio's, 36-year-old
Giuseppe Nirta, was arrested in Amsterdam in November 2008.
The feud between the Nirta-Strangio clan and the rival
Pelle-Vottari clan, which began with a wedding spat in 1991, has
claimed more than 20 lives.
The Duisburg massacre brought the Calabrian Mob to the
attention of a wider public and led to a recognition of its
position as Italy's most dangerous mafia.
Ndrangheta' (from a Greek word meaning 'heroism' or
virtue') once lived in the twin shadow of its Sicilian cousin
Cosa Nostra and the Camorra in Naples.
Now regarded as the strongest and most impenetrable of
Italy's mafias, its power base has been consolidated by its
domination of the European cocaine market.
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