By Wladimir Pantaleone
PALERMO, Italy (Reuters) – Perfumes and designer label clothes were found on Tuesday in an apartment which investigators believe was the last hideout of Sicilian mafia boss Matteo Messina Denaro, judicial sources said, a day after the arrest of the 60-year-old fugitive.
The apartment is located in an a modest building near the centre of Campobello di Mazara, a town in the Western Sicilian province of Trapani, just a few kilometres from Messina Denaro’s home town of Castelvetrano, the sources said. No weapons were found.
“We believe it is a house continuously used in the most recent period, a house that has been regularly occupied and in which we think we can find significant elements,” General Pasquale Angelosanto of the Carabinieri police ROS special forces said.
Messina Denaro, caught on Monday at a private hospital in Palermo after 30 years on the run, was known for his taste for luxury goods, including sun glasses and clothes. Police said he was wearing a watch worth 35,000 euros ($38,000) when he was arrested.
Nicknamed “‘U Siccu” (The Skinny One), Messina Denaro picked up 20 life prison terms in trials held in absentia for his role in an array of mob murders, including the bomb attacks that killed anti-mafia prosecutors Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino in 1992.
Investigators believe Messina Denaro was driven on Monday to Palermo’s La Maddalena hospital from Campobello di Mazara to be treated for cancer. The town was home to his alleged aide Giovanni Luppino, who was arrested with him.
Italian media reported Messina Denaro was moved away from Sicily following his arrest and landed late on Monday in the central Italian region of Abruzzo, but it was still unclear where he would be detained.
Despite his illness, prosecutors said Messina Denaro was fit enough to serve time in prison where he will carry on with his cancer treatment. ($1 = 0.9232 euros)
(Writing by Angelo Amante; Editing by Keith Weir)
