The Court of Cassation closed with two convictions the trial resulting from the «Decollo money» operation launched – with the coordination of the Catanzaro DDA – in July 2011 to shed light on an attempt to launder money presumed to be the proceeds of cocaine drug trafficking set up by the cocaine broker Vincenzo Barbieri, killed in San Calogero (in the Vibonese area) in March 2011. The convictions for the crime of money laundering therefore remain confirmed – with exclusion of the purposes mafia – against Giorgio Galiano, 51 years old, of Vibo Valentia (son-in-law of the deceased Vincenzo Barbieri) and the former general director of Credito Sammarinese Walter Vendemini, 71 years old, of Santarcangelo di Romagna. For both, the sentence amounts to 3 years and 4 months, plus a five-year ban from holding public office.
For the Catanzaro DDA, the attempt to launder the proceeds of drug trafficking managed in the San Marino bank amounted to a total of 15 million euros. For the Court of Cassation it remained established that the negotiations in 2010 had taken place exclusively between Vincenzo Barbieri and Walter Vendemini. The latter, having gone to a hotel, had transported for the first time (on 28 December 2010), inside a bag, around 600 thousand euros in cash and then over 700 thousand euros (again in cash) deposited in the bank and paid into Barbieri’s current account. However, the subsequent arrest of the drug trafficker (January 2012) would have caused the money laundering operation to fail. Vendemini was deemed by the judges to be the “director of the entire operation to conceal the criminal origin of Barbieri’s money”.