A two-year investigation culminated this week with 90 arrests, splitting wide open a mafia coalition that trafficked drugs to Europe from across the world. Here’s how the clans ran it.
A lieutenant in one of the world’s most powerful criminal organizations isn’t a man anyone wants to anger, but on Dec. 3, 2016, Domenico Pelle’s temper was on full display....MUCH MORE
Pelle was chasing down a retail buyer who owed him 27,000 euros for a load of cocaine.
“I’m going to pull his head off and throw it in the middle of the road,” Pelle promised the wayward dealer’s mother and sisters in the southern Italian town of Siderno.
Coming as it did from the head of the Pelle-Vottari clan — a grouping within the formidable ‘Ndrangheta mafia — it was a threat the family may well have taken literally.
On Wednesday, authorities dramatically curtailed Pelle’s ability to wield such power, arresting him along with 89 others associated with the ‘Ndrangheta on charges that included mafia-type association, international drug trafficking, and money laundering.
Eurojust, the European Union agency that orchestrates judicial action among member states, coordinated police forces in Italy, Germany, Belgium, and the Netherlands to bring down members of several different ‘Ndrangheta clans.
The international police operation — the Italian files of which were examined by reporters — shed a light on a multi-million-euro business that smuggled loads of cocaine as large as 200 kilograms from Brazil, Guyana, and Colombia into Rotterdam and Antwerp.
“It is proven once again,” reads the arrest warrant of the Court of Reggio Calabria, “drug trafficking is the core business of the ‘Ndrangheta clans, representing the gold mine the ‘Ndrangheta uses to then invest in the legal economy in Italy and abroad.”
A New Network
Domenico Pelle is only 26, but he had inherited the command of the powerful Pelle-Vottari clan (often referred to simply as the Pelle) when his father and older brother were arrested one after the other.
In the 1990s, the clan was trapped in a bloody feud with the rival Nirta-Strangio family which culminated, in 2007, in an infamous bloodbath in Germany known as the “Duisburg massacre.” Hundreds of arrests followed, and since then the Pelle have been rebuilding their power and finances.
Yesterday’s joint international police operation shows the extent to which the clan had succeeded, building a European-wide cocaine trafficking and money laundering network that involved members of at least two other clans and a smattering of freelancers. The Pelle had partnered with the Romeo clan and their allies, the Giorgi, as well as independent narcos linked to the Ietto family.
As members of a single mafia, these family-based clans from the mountainous Locride region in Calabria are fiercely loyal to each other. This makes them almost impermeable to infiltration, either from undercover cops or rival criminal groups.
But they have also proven flexible and creative, able to make useful alliances that helped them conquer new territories and find partners across the ocean.
The Pelle had not been known as one of the narco-trafficking families. The investigation shows that they had compensated for their lack of experience by connecting with the other clans. On one side, the freelance narcos associated with the Ietto family have direct contacts in Latin America. On the other, the Romeo have access to ports in Northern Europe that can be used for import.
Last but not least are the Giorgi, who have been trafficking drugs in Germany and the Netherlands for decades, are experienced with transport logistics, and know how to launder money....
