30 years after the assassination of Judge Giovanni Falcone, his sister is still waiting for answers

Thirty years after the brutal assassination of Italy’s most famous judge, his sister Mary He still doesn’t know who, other than mafia “capo” Salvatore ‘Toto’ Riina, was behind the death of Giovanni Falcone, the man who changed history because, behind him, the mafia was never the same.

“I’m always waiting for more research to give us the full picture of everyone wants Giovanni to die”, María Falcone assures the family home, which has spent these three decades dedicated to ensuring that the judge’s legacy reaches new generations.

Thanks to his investigations and trust of Tommaso Buscetta, the first great “pentito” (repentant).

On May 23, 1992, 500 kilos of explosives exploded on the highway between the airport and Palermo in Capaci, he was killed; his wife, Judge Francesca Morvillo, and three men from his escort. Less than two months later, the mafia removed his friend in another horrific attack. Paolo Borsellinoanother great anti-mafia judge.

The “convergence of interests”

Who killed his brother?

“I always come back to judicial truth, as Giovanni taught me” and “trials put the entire mafia leadership in jail,” replied this 86-year-old woman who ended up in life, or in instead of death, activist.

“That his murder was materially made and in the interest of the mafia, there is no doubt. If behind that mafia was (…) there was a convergence of interests from the other party, from politics, from finance , I am not able to say this, although there is evidence of a separate case, ”he explained.

Some magistrates “said that there were investigations that led to such a meeting of interests. However, in these years the mafiosi did not give big names. Buscetta gave (seven -time Prime Minister Giulio) Andreotti and (…) that has been proven the mafia and Andreotti had contacts for electoral purposesthe famous ‘exchange vote’ ”.

An agreement in which the mafia got the votes for the Government in exchange for impunity: With the exception of Lima, Andreotti’s husband in Sicily, he was murdered because he could not guarantee, Maria recalls.

The “Falcon Way”

If there is one thing that characterized the judge in life, it was his sense of duty, according to his sister, who remembers the “turmoil” he caused in his family, “very united and religious, like all in Sicily” , knowing that he was a “communist”. But “he wore a cross around his neck to the end,” he added with a smile.

Falcone noon “the quintessential anti-mafia magistrate”but in 1980, when “investigating judge (Roco) Chinnici assigned him the first trial, he was from the mafia I know very little“.

That’s where the famous “Falcone method” began to take shape, when the judge focused “in income and finance”.

“I remember this house (…) all tables full of checks. There was no computer then. He and a Finance Guard captain went to each other to establish the links on which the operation would be born. ‘Pizza Connection’which allowed us to discover the relationship between the Italian and American mafia ”, he explains, boasting of the friendships his brother has formed in the US.

Especially with Louis Freech, who later, as director of the FBI, erected a monument at Quantico Academy (Virginia) and placed banks so that future agents “Sit down and think of Giovanni.”

A sad man

In Italy, Falcone collaborated with a handful of magistrates to build the famous “Pool” achieved unprecedented results and it ended in 1986 in the “maxi trial”, with nearly 500 defendants, the highest point of its popularity.

He then found himself more alone: ​​“Many of the other magistrates opposed him (…) I don’t know how many just because of envy and how much for the popular convergence of interests, as well as so many politicians ”.

That separation led to his murder, but the shooting went back to “Cosa Nostra”: “After his death the society of Palermo was discovered”, the same society that a few days before complained about the sound of sirens of the judge’s escorts, “beside him”.

“That’s what pushed me to do what I’ve been doing these 30 years,” explains María, who became emotional when she mentioned the “little piece of paper” that was placed after her death under the so -called “Falcone tree” and that “they say: they closed 5 Italians, but they opened it to 50 million”.

His legacy

María is convinced that the Capaci tragedy and the other brutal attacks in 1992 were a “big mistake” by “Totó” Riinabecause they lead “to an action worthy of the rule of law” and “the total defeat of the mafia” as it is known.

“They created a massive reaction from civil society that led to many investigations applying Giovanni’s ideas”, such as “law on associates of justice” (…); the article prevents interaction between the imprisoned mafioso and the organization ”and“ individually, all his intuition ”, including the National Antimafia Directorate.

Thirty years later, it is “a fact” that Judge Falcone’s legacy lives on: “A Sicilian district with 16 schools called me to participate in the demonstration in memory of Giovanni.” EFE

The author is a journalist for the EFE agency

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