Word: capo
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...local overlord. Paramilitary leader Diego Fernando Murillo, a.k.a. Don Berna, had a monopoly over the drug trade, ruling his empire and followers even from prison. But when Don Berna was extradited to the U.S. in 2008, mid-level narco-traffickers started fighting to fill the power vacuum the capo had left. "Little cats became tigers," says a former drug trafficker. Many demobilized paramilitary fighters picked up arms again instead of pursuing the work training and education opportunities offered by the government...
Berlusconi's so-called mediocracy works in two ways. Critics claim that his Mediaset network slants its TV news coverage to favor Berlusconi's political fortunes. At the same time, his parliamentary allies are accused of using the levers of government to give a boost to the gran capo's business interests (which also include publishing, real estate and financial holdings beyond the core television company). Indeed, critics say that Mediaset has relied on favorable legislation in its recent efforts to undercut the Sky Italia satellite TV network set up by Berlusconi's rival, Rupert Murdoch. (Read "Berlusconi vs. Murdoch...
...bloody takeover of the Mafia by the Corleone faction in the early 1980s, had never made more than a passing (and indecipherable) allusion about the crime to the authorities since his arrest in Palermo a year after the Borsellino killing. His longtime partner in crime and successor as capo dei capi, Bernardo Provenzano, has also stayed mum since his capture near Corleone in 2006. Known as Cosa Nostra, the Sicilian Mob has long maintained power on the island (and beyond) with the help of omertà, a vow of silence and absolute refusal to cooperate with authorities. Most had expected...
...Pablo Escobar to move cocaine. Félix Gallardo also began to grow marijuana and opium - the raw ingredient for heroin - on Mexican soil. There were 15 arrest warrants with his name on them in Mexico and others in the United States before Mexican federal agents finally nabbed the capo without firing a shot in 1989. "Félix Gallardo had become the most wanted drug trafficker both at national and international level," the federal attorney general's office wrote after the arrest. "This shows the willingness of [then President] Carlos Salinas to fight this social cancer to whatever...
...which asked him about the 1985 murder of its agent Enrique Camarena. The drug kingpin denied that he had any involvement in that slaying, which had created a furor in Washington and led to pressure to round up top traffickers. "I was taken to the DEA," recalled the capo. "I greeted them and they wanted to talk. I only answered that I had no involvement in the Camarena case and I said, 'You said a madman would do it and I am not mad. I am deeply sorry for the loss of your agent...