Attacks and intimidations have caused social alarm in the Sybarite territory. The Minister of the Interior, Matteo Piantedosi, during his visit to Crotone announced in recent days that he will also be coming to the Cosentino area in the near future. The police commissioner of Cosenza, Giuseppe Cannizzaro, is a senior director of public security with great experience gained in the field: he has worked in various “difficult” areas of our region, he has dealt with crime at a national level and has been involved with results flattering in the most complex Tuscan city – Prato – where the interests of Chinese and Italian crime merge.
Commissioner, what is your impression after this first period spent leading the Police in this province?
«The Cosentino is an area characterized by two specificities. The first: the intellectual and cultural effervescence of the area, accompanied by the presence of a large university and institutions that have been engaged in the sector of promoting culture for decades. The second: there are, and we must not ignore, historical and evolving criminal realities.”
Which ones are you referring to?
«In the Sibaritide area, vast and rich in production and tourist-accommodation settlements, there has been, for example, a fusion between criminal systems: the traditional ‘Ndrangheta one with the nomadic one. It is a truly unique criminal “laboratory” in the southern context.”
A “laboratory” against which you are acting as a police force?
«The latest operations of the Catanzaro DDA have already certified the existence of this combination and have highlighted a delinquent reality characterized by aggressiveness. Think of the intimidation carried out against businesses and representatives of institutions. Having said this, I can assure you that the device put in place by the police develops along several lines which concern both the control of the territory and intelligence action. Not only that: we have also intensified prevention tools under the specific responsibility of the Police Commissioner as a public safety authority. I am referring to personal prevention measures and checks in public places. All our activities are also the result of a special synergy triggered with the judicial authority, i.e. with the District Prosecutor’s Office of Catanzaro and with the prosecutor’s offices of Castrovillari and Paola.
What is the relationship with local administrators?
«Of maximum closeness and constant interlocution as we have demonstrated during the last serious episodes. To this I would add the technical checks we are carrying out to verify the functioning and level of coverage of the video surveillance systems in the area. Systems that must work better because they are crucial technological tools in the investigative field.”
Concretely, what is the intervention you are implementing in Sibaritide at the moment?
«In terms of territorial control, rational management of the available resources also through the use of the Crime Prevention Department which supports and supports the police stations present. Then we are resorting to inter-force interventions, with the Carabinieri and Financial Police and dog units, to carry out increasingly effective activities and acquire and update a wealth of information essential to develop investigative activities.
What do you feel like saying to the citizens of Cosentino?
«A province so advanced from a cultural and productive point of view cannot bow to the subculture of violence and oppression. Rather, it is necessary to network with educational agencies, parishes, employers’ associations, business representatives, voluntary groups in order to form a collective conscience that acts as a barrier against the misleading models proposed by crime. I can say that both personally and as the State Police – but I think I can speak on behalf of all the police forces – we are available to participate in initiatives promoted in schools, in university and association offices, in parish communities with the aim of contribute to the formation of civic sense and the widespread culture of legality. To all citizens I say: have faith in the State.”