The founder of the Nuova Camorra Organizzata, better known as 'O'professore' di Ottaviano was detained under the 41 bis regime and definitively sentenced to 4 life sentences.
Considered responsible for the bloodiest pages of organized crime in all of Campania, which go from the end of the 70s to the end of the 80s. Cutolo was also found guilty of the murders of the former vice-director of the Poggioreale prison Giuseppe Salvia and for the murder of Marcello Torre, lawyer and mayor of Pagani.
Raffaele Cutolo, a professor despite only having an elementary school education, is the son of a sharecropper and a washerwoman from Ottaviano, Michele and Carolina Ambrosio. Born on November 4, 1941, his criminal career was built within the framework of romantic, perhaps fictionalized, adventures. A poet and duelist with a "clothes peg" inside a prison; mad, either pretending or truly mad; an escapee from the Aversa asylum; a fugitive, a father who sees his only son and heir killed by the 'Ndrangheta; the man who perhaps inspired Fabrizio De André's famous "The Professor" and probably urinated on Toto Riina's shoes, according to a repentant criminal.
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At 22, he committed his first murder on September 24, 1963, during a brawl; the victim was Mario Viscito, who had paid too much attention to Cutolo's sister, Rosetta, the woman who would support him even years later in managing his criminal power. He acknowledged two children: Roberto, born from his brief relationship with Filomena Liguori, and Denise, daughter of Immacolata Iacone, the woman he would marry in Asinara prison, conceived through artificial insemination and who would see him forever behind bars. He has two grandchildren, Raffaele, 34, his namesake, and Roberta, 30, both children of Roberto, a convicted felon killed in Tradate, Lombardy, by 'Ndrangheta members on December 19, 1990, at the behest of one of Cutolo's main rivals, the Vesuvian boss Mario Fabbrocino.
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During one of his periods as a fugitive, he had a relationship with Lidarsa Bent Brahim Radhia, a Tunisian woman to whom he dedicated a poem, who gave birth to Yosra. In 1980, Cutolo purchased the Medici Castle in Ottaviano from Maria Capece Minutolo, widow of Prince Lancellotti di Lauro, for 1991 million lire. It was confiscated in 270 and now belongs to the municipality of Ottaviano, the castle where his parents had worked as guards. He was sentenced to four life sentences, to be served starting in 1995 under the 41 bis regime. The boss has repeatedly criticized this regime, which he believes violates human rights. For his first murder, Cutolo was sentenced to 22 years on appeal, which he is starting to serve in the Naples-Poggioreale prison. And it is in this prison that his personality and charisma emerge, when, in the inmates' relationship dynamics, he challenges the boss Antonio Spavone to a duel, a challenge with a switchblade, a clothespin, to which the latter does not show up.
Cutolo became the protector of all inmates. In 1970, he was released after serving his sentence and began dealing cigarettes, a lucrative business that brought him into contact with the Apulian underworld and then with the 'ndrine of the Mamolitos, Cangemis, and De Stefanos. He was arrested again in 1971, and it was once again in Poggioreale that he contemplated the creation of the New Organized Camorra. This was a new clan model, based on the pyramid structures (picciotto, camorrista, sgarrista, capozona, and santista) of the Sicilian Mafia and the 'Ndrangheta, with affiliation through Masonic-inspired rituals and a personality cult of the boss. Above all, it was an ideologically driven conception of organized crime, with a southern and rebellious outlook, yet also endowed with economic power, so much so that Cutolo wanted to partner with an entrepreneur, Alfonso Rosanova, capable of multiplying the proceeds of illicit business.
And then there's the paramilitary organization, the base of young and ruthless picciotti recruited from the underclass, eager for redemption and easy money. Myriad articles and books have been written about his life, and even films have been made. He was also involved in negotiations for the release of Ciro Cirillo, a member of the Campania DC party led by Antonio Gava, kidnapped by the Red Brigades in April 1981, a complex affair that remains unclear.
Don Raffaele made statements to investigators from the Naples District Anti-Mafia Directorate (prosecutor Ida Teresi and the head of the DDA at the time, Giuseppe Borrelli, now the prosecutor in Salerno), revealing that he even had the opportunity to prevent the Red Brigades' murder of Aldo Moro. The professor's words, recorded in the official record on October 25, 2016, were "harsh": "I could have saved Moro, but I was stopped." "I helped," Cutolo explained, "Councilor Cirillo [who was kidnapped and later released by the Red Brigades], and I could have done the same with the statesman. But the politicians told me not to interfere." In 78, Cutolo was a fugitive and came forward to try, he claims, to save Moro. "Everyone took action for Ciro Cirillo, but no one did for Aldo Moro. For him, the politicians told me to stop, that they weren't interested in Moro."
"I could have saved Moro, but I was stopped." Raffaele Cutolo's last truth, or at least his, about his role in the relationship between the Red Brigades, the secret services, and politicians, dates back five years. It is contained in an interrogation report. "I helped," this is the story of the superboss who died today, "regional councilor Ciro Cirillo [kidnapped and later released by the Red Brigades, ed.], I could have done the same with the statesman. But the politicians told me not to interfere." In 78, Cutolo was a fugitive and came forward to try, he claims, to save Moro. "Everyone took action for Ciro Cirillo, no one for Aldo Moro, and for him the politicians told me to stop, that they weren't interested in Moro." Cutolo's statements date back to October 25, 2016, in response to questions from prosecutor Ida Teresi and the then head of the Anti-Mafia Directorate, Giuseppe Borrelli. Cutolo's interrogation took place in Parma's super-prison, where the boss was being held serving four life sentences. It was part of an investigation into the criminal history of his longtime lieutenant, Pasquale Scotti, who was arrested after 30 years on the run.
The content of that interrogation—which Il Mattino reported—came to light thanks to the administrative proceedings before the Regional Administrative Court (TAR) resulting from the prosecutors' decision to reject Scotti's cooperation. Cutolo focused in particular on the negotiations for the release of regional councilor Ciro Cirillo, released on April 27, 1981, a few months after his kidnapping and the payment of a ransom of 1 billion lire. While he was incarcerated in the Ascoli Piceno prison, just as negotiations for Cirillo's release began, Cutolo said he had met with several politicians who had come to plead the DC councilor's cause. He then spoke of his lack of involvement in the possible negotiations for Moro and said that the Interior Minister at the time, Francesco Cossiga, "refused to meet with me," since Cutolo was a fugitive at the time.
However, there are two different versions of the mediators who allegedly intervened to ask him to save Aldo Moro's life. During his interrogation by Neapolitan prosecutors, Cutolo stated that "Michelino Senese (a Camorra member who lived in Rome, ed.) proposed it to me when I was a fugitive." To the Roman prosecutors who questioned him at the same time, he instead named Nicolino Selis, a member of the Magliana gang (a circumstance reported by the Corriere della Sera in 2016). Cutolo also sent coded messages regarding the Cirillo affair ("We had documents to use against politicians regarding the facts of the negotiations: some were held by Enzo Casillo—one of the NCO's key figures, later killed in the Camorra war, ed.—other documents, however, I have, but they will die with me." With his death, Cutolo takes these secrets to the grave, along with many others relating to deviant elements of the state in the XNUMXs.
The last time he made headlines was in mid-2020, due to the complex situation surrounding his illness and the March circular from the Department of Penal Administration (DAP) that allowed inmates under the 41-bis regime to be placed under house arrest if they were elderly or had medical conditions. And the boss, who became legendary even while alive as 'o professore, was elderly, 80 years old, many of which had been spent in various Italian prisons, and sick. On February 19, 2020, he had already been admitted to Parma's civil hospital for a respiratory crisis and had also refused treatment and a CT scan. Discharged in early April and returned to Parma prison, his lawyer, Gaetano Aufiero, had requested house arrest from the Reggio Emilia court due to his health conditions, but the request was rejected because he could be treated in prison and his medical conditions did not "pose additional risk," given that the 41 bis regime allowed him "to have a single room, equipped with the necessary medical devices."
Cutolo reiterated his request, and on June 10, the Bologna Surveillance Court rejected it again: "It can be assumed that Raffaele Cutolo's presence could strengthen the criminal groups that still refer to the NCO, groups in which Cutolo has fully retained his charisma," the judges wrote. Cutolo "does not appear likely to be at risk of contracting Covid-19," and, "despite his age and continued detention, he represents a 'symbol' for all those criminal groups that continue to invoke his name."
His presence "could strengthen the criminal groups that still refer to the NCO, groups in which Cutolo has fully retained his charisma. In his many years of detention, he has never shown any sign of abandoning his criminal practices." On July 30, 2020, he was transferred from prison back to the hospital. According to his lawyer, he is no longer lucid, given that his wife went to visit him on June 22 and Cutolo did not recognize her.
