ST LOUIS (LALATE) – Student Melissa Bassi was killed in a Brindisi, Italy bombing today at Francesca Laura Morvillo Falcone school. While the Mafia has yet to be linked to Melissa Bassi’s killing, the Cosa Nostra is credited with the tragic 1992 Sicily highway bombing that killed Giovanni Falcone and Francesca Laura Morvillo Falcone. Bassi’s school was named after Ms. Falcone.

The bomb went off shortly before 8 am today. Classes were already in session for the fashion school with teenagers on campus. Melissa Bassi was 16 years old.

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ST LOUIS (LALATE) – The Calabrese mafiosa in Monasterace, Italy has prompted Mayor Maria Carmella Lanzetta to resign. The mafia in Monasterace, Italy, a town in Calabria near Sicily, has become so violent that its own mayor has now announced her resignation. She calls her town lawless and unable to combat mafia pressures.

Mayor Lanzetta tells news that, since serving as mayor, the mafia has burned her family’s business and shot at her car. Lanzetta took over as mayor of Monasterace in 2006.

Monasterace might appear as a super small, quaint town. But after coming into office, Lanzetta ironically found that there was enormous government debt. As soon as she began investigating the debts, her business was burned to the ground, while she was inside of it. After she fled safely, she was later shot at in her car.

Monasterace, in her words, has become lawless. The town is given such few funds to combat crime, that Lanzetta claims the mafia can do as it wishes. So she is resigning. She said the assassination attempt was her final straw. Officials have yet to announce replacement elections.

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ST LOUIS (LALATE) – Michele Zagaria, the Camorra mafia leader, has been arrested near Naples. Michele Zagaria (photos below) was the Casalesi head, some experts claim. He was discovered in a secret bunker this week.

Michele Zagaria was wanted by police, and evaded their capture, for two decades. But today, Italian police confirmed news of his arrest, inside a secret bunker. The bunker was unearthed in a frantic dig in Zagaria’s home city of Casapesenna (located near Naples).

Michele Zagaria Pictures
Michele Zagaria Photo 1
Michele Zagaria Photo 2
Michele Zagaria Photo 3

Investigators believe that Casalesi clan is section of the Camorra mafia crime family. Their network dominates Naples. Investigators believe that Michele Zagaria probably stayed right in his hometown region for two decades because of the clan’s stronghold. An international arrest warrant was outstanding since 2000.

The family was recently detailed in the book “Gomorrah” by Roberto Saviano. After being arrested, Zagaria allegedly told prosecutors “You won”. He had been hiding since the early 1990s.

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LOS ANGELES (LALATE) – Vinny Gorgeous Basciano (Vincent Basciano) could face the death penalty after the former Basciano mafia crime boss was found guilty of murder today. Vinny Gorgeous killed Frank Santoro in 2001; Basciano was already serving a life sentence for that killing when the 51 year old mob boss learned of today’s verdict.

Among the witnesses against him were former Bonanno mob boss Joseph Massino.

Today’s verdict is only the second time in three decades a mafia leader has faced the death penalty. A jury is now deliberating if Basciano should get life in prison without parole or death by lethal injection. Basciano was found guilty for the death of Randolph Pizzolo.

Assistant US Attorney Stephen Frank told jurors this week that Basciano “ordered the murder of Randolph Pizzolo, who disrespected and disobeyed the defendant and paid for it with his life.”

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ST LOUIS (LALATE) – Enrico Ponzo has been captured after living the life of “Jay Shaw” on a ranch for years. Enrico Ponzo’s life the last ten years sounded like a bad TV movie of the week. Ponzo was an alleged Italian mafia leader, with a thick New Yorker accent, trying to pass a cattle rancher in Idaho, and not even knowing the difference between a cow and bull.

Now the Feds have, well, roped in Enrico Ponzo after ten years of searching. They found him a rural section of Idaho.

Ponzo allegedly attempted to kill Cadillac Frank Salemme aka Francis P. Salemme aka Julian Daniel Selig. Cadillac Frank was head of the Patriarca family when Ponzo attempted to kill him in 1989 at an IHOP in Saugus, Massachusetts.

An Idaho neighbor of Ponzo, the wantabe rancher, reportedly said that Ponzo clearly was up to no good hanging out in Idaho, taking a job that he had no idea how to do. “He was a city slicker who didn’t know nothing. He didn’t know the difference between a cow, a bull and a steer.”

Ponzo was charged with attempted murder Wednesday.

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