Matteo Messina Denaro had been on the run since 1993.
The 60-year-old mafia boss Matteo Messina Denaro was caught just outside a private clinic in Sicily's capital, Palermo, where he was receiving treatment for cancer.
Here are five points on mafia boss Matteo Messina Denaro:
- Matteo Messina Denaro is alleged to be a boss of the notorious Cosa Nostra Mafia, the real-life Sicilian crime syndicate depicted in the famous 'Godfather' movies.
- The 60-year-old had been on the run since 1993. According to the BBC, he is set to be imprisoned for two bombings in Sicily in 1992 that murdered top-anti-Mafia prosecutors, Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino, Falcone's wife and several of their bodyguards. He also faces another life sentence for his role in bomb attacks in Florence, Rome and Milan that killed 10 people in 1993, and is accused of kidnapping, torturing and killing 11-year-old son of a mafioso-turned-state witness.
- Matteo Messina Denaro once boasted he could "fill a cemetery" with his victims. He also oversaw racketeering, illegal waste dumping, money laundering and drug trafficking for the powerful Cosa Nostra organised crime syndicate.
- According to The Guardian, Messina Denaro's immense wealth came from his investments in energy and refuse, successfully infiltrating the local government to get control of important building contracts.
- He is thought to be Cosa Nostra's last "secret-keeper". He was the last of three longtime fugitive top-level Mafia bosses who had for decades eluded capture.
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