Italian police conducted a bold dawn raid this morning, seizing a prominent mafia boss. Leonardo Gesualdo, the 39-year-old mafia chief of the Foggia Society, was apprehended by the Italian Carabinieri. Gesualdo, a high-ranking fugitive, was captured in a surprise operation at his residence on the outskirts of Foggia.
The Foggia Society, known for its extreme brutality, has been linked to frequent criminal activities in the region, including a murder weekly, daily robberies, and bi-daily extortion attempts. Gesualdo, who has been on the run since 2020, was convicted in absentia and sentenced to 12 years for his involvement in mafia activities.
During the arrest, armed officers broke into the property in southern Italy and found an illegal pistol with a removed serial number in Gesualdo’s possession. In a separate incident earlier this year, Sicilian mafia bosses were overheard complaining about the quality of new recruits and expressing a desire for a lifestyle resembling “The Godfather,” a famous movie depicting a powerful Mafia boss.
Giancarlo Romano, a notorious Mafia figure in Palermo, Sicily, lamented the lack of loyalty among new members who were quick to cooperate with authorities, breaking the Mafia’s code of silence. Romano and other mafia bosses expressed nostalgia for the influence and connections depicted in “The Godfather,” contrasting it with their current diminished status in the criminal hierarchy.
The intercepted calls revealed the mafia bosses’ concerns about their declining power and influence, with Romano advising a young recruit to pursue education and social connections with influential individuals in society. The wiretaps also exposed the aliases used by mafia leaders to address each other, including Spider-Man, Bear, Nephew, and Robert De Niro, a reference to characters from The Godfather series.