Italian authorities have searched the home where Cosa Nostra kingpin Matteo Messina allegedly currently resided, in the name of a person whose identity he had borrowed and who is also under investigation, as well as the doctor who was treating him for cancer at a private clinic in Palermo, Sicily.
The operation carried out on Monday by the Carabinieri to arrest Messina, a fugitive for 30 years, has led to a new phase of investigations in which security forces and the Prosecutor’s Office are focusing on gathering as much evidence as possible and following various leads.
One of them starts from a car key found in Messina’s pocket and has led to a house owned by Andrea Bonafede, the name under which the mafia leader was undergoing cancer treatment in a clinic and with which he had created a false identity document.
The real Bonafede is already on the list of suspects of the Palermo Prosecutor’s Office, according to the AdnKronos agency. Also on this list is the doctor Alfonso Tumbarello, responsible for the care of the capo, to determine if any of them incurred in some kind of criminal act.
The head of oncology at the clinic, Vittorio Gebbia, has acknowledged that Messina’s condition «is serious» and has affirmed that the patient at no time did anything that could raise suspicions among the medical team, according to the newspaper ‘La Repubblica’. The Cosa Nostra leader is now being held in a prison in L’Aquila.
In his house, the authorities have not found any weapons, although some luxury items have been found. However, work continued on Tuesday in search of biological clues or possible hiding places or documents that could support the accusations against Messina and even arrest other criminals.
Source: (EUROPA PRESS)
