Sicilian Blood

In the district of Palermo known as Abbot's Villa, few citizens were more warmly respected than heavy-jawed Antonino Cottone. A onetime butcher who prospered mightily during the U.S. occupation of Sicily, Nino Cottone was respected partly for his wealth and partly for his excellent connections in the Demo-Christian Party. But the foundation of Nino's respectability was the fact that he was boss of the "Mafia of the Gardens"--the section of the world-famous Sicilian criminal syndicate that "protects" Palermo's fruit marketmen and citrus growers.

One night last week prosperous Nino Cottone, 52, returning home late, gently backed his little Fiat station wagon into the drive of his summer villa. He had just locked the car when he was bowled along the driveway by two streams of machine-gun bullets. As his family and friends poured out of their houses, Nino painfully lifted up his bullet-ridden body and stumbled to the threshold of his villa, where, leaning against the door, he died on his feet as a good Sicilian should.

Streamlined Service. Nino Cottone's death was one more indication of an amazing change in Sicily. For more than a century any Sicilian who paid "protection" to the Mafia was virtually immune from theft or attack. In those days the murder of a Mafia member like Nino meant only one thing--he had betrayed the organization. Lately, however, the once unquestioned authority of the Mafia has been challenged by a rival syndicate that calls itself Anonima Delitte--Crime Incorporated. In the past two years Crime Inc. has murdered 22 Mafia men. Result: a sharp drop in public faith in the effectiveness of Mafia protection and an increasing number of clients for Crime Inc.'s protection service.

Mafia's decline dates from the Italian government's success six years ago in arranging the murder of famed Mafia Leader Salvatore Giuliano by his cousin Gaspare Pisciotta (TiME, July 17, 1950). thereby not only ridding Mafia of one of its most powerful leaders but also destroying that confidence in each other that was the Mafia's most compelling tie.

Like any threatened monopoly, the Mafia has fought back. Last June two Crime Incers who had apparently defied Nino Cottone's rule of the fruit market were rubbed out in the heart of Crime Inc. territory, a Palermo suburb called Torrelunga. And when Nino was killed most of Palermo expected that the next move would be a revenge murder by the Mafia.

Instead, the next man to fall was Angelo Galatolo, a Mafia member whose brother was the first Mafia chieftain killed by Crime Inc. Twelve hours after Nino Cottone's death a police patrol near the village of Villa Pantelleria came upon a mule dragging an empty, bloodstained cart. Following a telltale trail of blood down the lonely road along which the mule had come, the police finally found the body of Angelo Galatolo, lying face down in the dust.

Among the first to turn up at the scene of Galatolo's murder was the dead man's weeping son. Suspiciously the police asked how he had learned about the crime so quickly. Said the boy contemptuously: "Why, the whole of Palermo knows Angelo Galatolo is dead, shot while driving a borrowed donkey cart. It's only the police who are surprised."

Tribal Patterns. Italian police were unhappily forced to concede that they have little effect on either Mafia or Crime Inc. Many Italians are inclined to blame police ineffectiveness on the fact that carabinieri forces in Sicily are staffed and directed by mainland Italians, who do not understand the Sicilian temperament and the intricate, tribal patterns of Sicilian behavior.

Said one Sicilian last week: "The people know that good people aren't attacked. It is the criminals who eliminate each other." Besides, it is doubtful whether even a Sicilian-run police force could soon overcome the centuries-old code of omerta, which makes informing--even against a rival gang--the greatest sin. Commenting on last week's murders, one Palermi-ano said with undisguised pride: "The black-clad widows don't speak; nor the children who nourish in their breasts their first thoughts of hatred and vengeance. That is the way of Sicilian blood. "

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