Word: italianize
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...evening of Dec. 17, 1981, Red Brigades terrorists kidnaped Brigadier General James Dozier, 50, the highest-ranking U.S. officer in NATO's southern Europe command, from his home in Verona. The abduction triggered the largest man hunt in Italy's history. Forty-two days later, Italian commandos stormed an apartment in Padua and freed the American general. It was a stunning piece of police work that won praise from around the world; it also marked the beginning of the end for the notorious terrorist group. But the full story of how the authorities found Dozier has never been...
What occurred was a remarkable tale of triumphs and bungles, of Brooklyn consiglieri and Milan Mafiosi, of chases along New York City's Fifth Avenue and gun-toting criminals tailing intelligence agents along Italian autostrade. So secret was the operation that not even U.S. Ambassador to Italy Maxwell Rabb was aware of it until TIME Correspondent Jonathan Beaty, accompanied by Rome Correspondent Barry Kalb, questioned the diplomat two weeks ago. Beaty's report...
...took only two days for top officials at SISMI, the Italian intelligence agency, to decide that it might be useful to turn to the Mafia for help in finding General Dozier. Although the Mafia had long detested the Red Brigades, SISMI knew that there would be a public outcry if it was ever discovered that an Italian government agency had contacted the Mafia directly. Consequently, a more subtle plan was devised. An approach would be made to Mafiosi in the U.S., who would be asked to get in touch with their counterparts in Italy. Marcello Campione, then military attache...
That contact turned out to be Dominic Lombino, 40, a lawyer from Milan whose clients had included Franchino Restelli, the northern Italian city's leading Mafioso. Jailed briefly in 1978 for his Mafia associations, Lombino fled to the U.S. in July 1981 when Italian authorities suddenly seized his passport, a signal that they were preparing to indict him. The Italian military attaché told Lombino that he could make a lot of money if he would help with the Dozier case. On Dec. 22, only five days after Dozier had been abducted, Lombino phoned the Fat Man and then...
Attaché Campione quickly agreed. Over the Christmas holiday he developed a plan to sneak Lombino out of the U.S. and into Italy so that Lombino could talk with Restelli. Since Lombino was still a fugitive with no passport, the Italian official had to concoct a new identity for him. With the Fat Man's aid, Lombino acquired the Social Security number of an unwitting high school driver's education instructor from Brooklyn, while a cooperative priest in Manhattan provided him with false baptism records...