Police have arrested a 47-year-old nephew of captured Cosa Nostra super boss Bernando Provenzano on charges of being in cahoots with the Mafia. Carmelo Gariffo was arrested in Provenzano's home town of Corleone after police were able to decipher his name from the numerous coded 'pizzini', written notes the Mafia chief used to communicate with his underlings.
The messages were found in the farm house outside Corleone where Provenzano was finally nabbed after more than 40 years on the run.
Police believe that Gariffo may have been one of Provenzano's 'postmen' who delivered his uncle's written instructions to the Mafia don's lieutenants.
Police also raided Gariffo's secret office in Corleone where they impounded a personal computer and assorted papers and documents. According to police, not even Gariffo's wife knew about the small office. Gariffo's arrest was the first made possible by deciphering the pizzini.
Provenzano,73, was arrested April 11 after being a fugitive for over 43 years. He had become the undisputed 'boss of bosses' of the Sicilian Mafia with the January 1993 arrest of Salvatore (Toto') Riina, his fellow townsman and one-time rival as the mob's top hitman.
For some 40 years Provenzano's whereabouts and even his physical appearance were shrouded in mystery.
Investigators got a break two years ago when they learned that he had travelled to a Marseilles clinic twice in 2003 for prostate surgery under an assumed name. They arrested the Sicilian politician who obtained identity papers for the fugitive and he later turned state's witness.
Information offered by doctors and nurses at the clinic allowed computer experts to construct a more accurate identikit of the fugitive. Until then all police had to go on was a photograph taken over 40 years ago for Provenzano's identity card, before he went underground.
