Cosenza, Via Popilia massacre: final sentences. The Court of Cassation confirmed the life sentence for Fioravante Abbruzzese and Antonio Abbruzzese and the 30-year prison sentence for Celestino Bevilacqua. The same sentence was confirmed for Luigi Berlingieri. The judges of legitimacy instead ordered the annulment with postponement of the sentence to 12 years and 4 months for Saverio Madioaccepting the appeal presented by lawyers Aldo Truncè and Filippo Cinnante.
Franco Bevilacqua, of the “Francu i Mafarda”, at the time head of the nomadic crime group, has already been tried for the blood crime with a final sentence. The bloodthirsty boss, arrested by the police in a villa in Marina di Gioiosa Ionica in January 2001, subsequently decided to collaborate with justice by telling all the background to the ambush and having the carcass of the car used by the group of killers to leave the crime scene.
The slaughter
The criminal action carried out in the popular Bruzio neighborhood in via Popilia was decided by the “gypsies” to send a message of terror to the world of the traditional ‘Ndrangheta. On the evening of November 9, 2000, the command opened fire with Kalashnikovs, rifles and pistols against three men intent on talking in an open space in Via Popilia. For two of them – Benito Aldo Chiodo and Francesco Tucci – there was no escape; the third, Mario Trinni, managed to save himself by running at breakneck speed despite a wound in his arm. The ambush should have started a mafia war for control of the Bruzio capital. A war which then did not materialize precisely as a result of Bevilacqua’s arrest and subsequent collaboration with the justice system.