“Fortunato Zagaria has never gotten his hands dirty with the Camorra, and when in 2008 he advised Mayor Zara not to expose himself too much in anti-Camorra demonstrations or in any case not to praise the fight against the Camorra, it does not mean that he is in collusion, but he does so out of caution, because he realizes he is exercising a political mandate in an area with a high crime rate. 'And I am not a hero,' says Fortunato Zagaria”. This is what lawyer Paolo Trofino said during his speech at the court of Santa Maria Capua Vetere (Caserta) in the trial in which he is assisting the former mayor of Casapesenna (Caserta) Fortunato Zagaria, accused of private violence with mafia aggravation together with the Casalesi boss Michele Zagaria (they are namesakes, not relatives); injured party, who joined the civil action, another former mayor of the clan leader's hometown, Giovanni Zara, mayor of Casapesenna for less than a year between 2008 and 2009, when he was distrusted by his own majority and by his deputy mayor, Fortunato Zagaria, because, according to the DDA of NAPLES - the substitute Maurizio Giordano - he had gone against the clan. The prosecutor, during his closing speech, asked for a 10-year sentence for Fortunato Zagaria, asking that he also be convicted of Camorra association. "Zara is a good person and I accept the prosecutor's invitation not to descend into personal judgments", Trofino began, a different strategy compared to that of his defense colleague Giuseppe Stellato, who in his argument on November 5th had said that Zara "was politically zero" and that "his ingratitude towards Fortunato Zagaria reveals his human pettiness". Trofino claims that Zara's complaint against Fortunato Zagaria is the result of "ill will and political resentment", and then attacks the Anti-Mafia Prosecutor's Office for the management of the collaborators of justice who accused Fortunato Zagaria, mayor for 20 years of the town where the boss was born, raised and spent part of his time as a fugitive, until his capture in 2011. He defines the statements as "junk" and dismisses as "a big lie" the story of Michele Barone, former killer of the boss Zagaria, who spoke of a plan to attack Zara and her wife. "We are at the mercy of four informers who, to make themselves look good, to make nice reports - he states - accuse this man who is absolutely innocent. The trial shouts the innocence of the engineer Zagaria. There is no proof of the alleged political-mafia pact that the DDA is talking about. Twenty years of Fortunato Zagaria's life have been X-rayed, but important magistrates such as Cafiero de Raho or Franco Roberti, have never noticed"
Article published on November 27, 2019 - 14:32
