The Lattari Camorra Managed the Stolen Car Business: The Role of the Gentiles

The gang that laundered stolen cars with Spain, busted yesterday by the Carabinieri with sixteen arrests, was allegedly led by Vincenzo Gentile, son of Agerola's boss, Giuseppe, and the well-known convicted felon Liberato Spera, originally from Gragnano and resident in Santa Maria la Carità, in the Petraro area. Among the accomplices was another well-known figure in Agerola, Luigi Milano, 48, a barber with a minor drug conviction. In Tuscany, two more accomplices were arrested: Biagio Melisi, owner of a car dealership in Montecatini Terme, and Rosario Bozzanga, originally from Catania and resident in Cerreto Guidi in the province of Florence. Ten other people, all of Spanish nationality, were involved in the operation.
All five Italians are held responsible, to varying degrees, for criminal association aimed at the sale of clandestine weapons and receiving stolen cars, with the aggravating circumstance of transnationality, having acted in collaboration with a Spanish criminal group. At the same time, in Sueca, near Valencia, the Guardia Civil and the Spanish judiciary launched a similar operation, in which ten other people were involved, including some of Italian nationality.
Specifically, Gentile and Milano are accused of exchanging cars with Melisi and Bozzanga, which took place at the beginning of June 2017. The Neapolitans arrive in Tuscany with an Audi Q1, which they “exchange” for a Fiat 3 L and a Mini Country-man, one with a cloned license plate, the other a counterfeit. In addition, Gentile also gives Bozzanga a gun: an old 500 with a filed-off serial number. Then, with the two cars, the two try to board a ship bound for Spain from Civitavecchia, but the ship is too crowded and they have to postpone for a day. Gentile decides to return to Campania aboard the 7,65, together with Luigi Milano, after leaving the Mini in the parking lot of the Lazio port. And the next day, together with Milano, Liberato Spera boards the scheduled motor vessel bound for Barcelona with one of the two cars instead of Gentile. Once the delivery was made, a week later Spera returned to Italy, this time by plane.