Discover how the Scampia drug raid shook up the Campania region's drug trade. A daring robbery targeting 'Ndrangheta couriers changed the market.
- What happened: A shipment of twenty kilos of cocaine was stolen from Calabrian couriers.
- Because it is important: This attack marks a declaration of war between rival gangs.
- What to do now: Investigators are following up on the leads to prevent further conflicts.
- Useful detail: The operation was planned with military precision, using trusted resources and men.
When the call comes in, Simone Bartimoro, known as "Jet," isn't in Naples. He's hiding in Barcelona, protected by trusted men and phones that constantly change cards and identities. A fugitive, wanted, but still central to the drug trafficking network linking Spain to Campania.
According to what collaborators of justice say in the statements included in the precautionary order signed by investigating judge Carla Sarno, someone warned him that a huge shipment was about to arrive: twenty kilos of cocaine transported by Calabrian couriers and destined for the Amato-Pagano family.
A journey like any other. A million-dollar delivery. Then comes the sentence. "Twenty packages are arriving... have them carry out a robbery." It's not a vent. It's not a random idea. It's a decision.
On the other end of the line is Gaetano Angrisano, also a fugitive. He was surprised, the informants say. "At first he was shocked," one of them wrote, "because it was such a big deal. But then he accepted the tip and organized everything."
From that moment on, the story changes direction.
Because stealing drugs from Calabrian traffickers is tantamount to declaring war. Fabio Iazzetta takes over the operation. They need men who won't talk, weapons, and above all, a neutral zone. Casavatore becomes the perfect location: the edge of the city, with enough traffic to confuse movements but isolated enough to avoid prying eyes.
Meanwhile, the couriers depart Calabria, unaware they've already been sold. Sebastiano Romeo and Giovanni Nirta drive a dark Audi RS Q3 with German license plates. A fast, sporty car, chosen specifically to cover miles without attracting attention. Behind them is Andrea Giuliani in an old, dirt-covered gray Fiat Bravo.
That's the important car. There's no luggage inside. There are twenty kilograms of cocaine. Investigators estimate the market value at millions of euros. When they arrive in Naples, someone contacts them. A seemingly normal contact. A rendezvous that arouses no suspicion.
The coup's organizational chart
Once the decision was made, the machinery was set in motion with the precision of a military operation. Fabio Iazzetta, with the support of Luigi Rosas, took care of organizing the ambush in detail. The role of bait—the most delicate one, requiring physical approach to the couriers without arousing suspicion—was assigned to Ciro Musella, who was supposed to "hook" the Calabrians and lead them into the trap.
The chosen location was Via Francesco Caracciolo, in the municipality of Casavatore, on the border with the Municipality of Naples—a suburban street, unremarkable enough, with enough space to park two cars and enough isolation to get the job done quickly.
The operational commando consisted of Luigi Esposito and his brother Camillo, armed with a .38 caliber pistol and a .9mm short pistol, respectively. Closing the circle was Raffaele Russolillo, who was supposedly tasked with physically seizing the cargo, and a fourth member, identified by informants as "Felicione," who was driving the car. The vehicle, "Gino o'Zuppone," was responsible for monitoring the area from the outside, providing cover for the team.
The ambush on Via Caracciolo
It was April 2023. The three Calabrian couriers—Sebastiano Romeo, Giovanni Nirta, and Andrea Giuliani—had left Calabria in a luxury sports car and an old-school sedan.
Romeo and Nirta were traveling in a dark-colored Audi RS-Q3—a sporty SUV, a gasoline-powered model, with German license plates. Giuliani, meanwhile, was driving an old gray Fiat Bravo, a sedan, not a station wagon, covered in dirt like only the cars of those who travel on country roads can be. Hidden in the passenger compartment of that Bravo was the cargo: twenty kilograms of cocaine, wrapped and hidden with the care reserved for a fortune's worth of treasure.
Musella caught up with them, as expected, and drove them to Via Caracciolo. When the cars stopped, the trap was sprung. Luigi and Camillo Esposito got out, guns already drawn, and pointed them at the three Calabrians, ordering them to exit the vehicles. Romeo, Nirta, and Giuliani had no escape: they were in a foreign land, surrounded, and with the barrels of two pistols held at chest height.
It was Russolillo, along with Camillo Esposito, who asked the couriers to tell them where the drugs were hidden. They then took the shipment, loaded it into their car, and drove it to Iazzetta and Rosas. Once the operation was completed, they instructed Russolillo to hide the cocaine. In a matter of minutes, twenty kilos of drugs had changed hands. The Calabrian couriers were left empty-handed, on the street in Casavatore, left with nothing but shame and the fear of having to explain to the sender what had happened.
“Did you think we were joking?”
Raffaele Paone, one of the collaborators of justice interviewed between 2024 and 2025 during the investigations conducted by the Investigative Unit of the Carabinieri of Naples, says he learned of it directly between May and June 2023, when the memory of the action was still fresh.
"It seemed unlikely to me," the collaborator admits. So unlikely that he needed proof. And Iazzetta provided it immediately: "To confirm its veracity, he gave me 2500 euros on the spot. He, who has never given me anything, has never given me anything."
But the most colorful confirmation came from Gino “o'Zuppone”, the operation's watchdog, who, faced with the repentant's incredulity, burst out laughing and said: “Did you think we were joking?”
That laugh, recorded in black and white in the preliminary investigations judge Sarno's order, is worth more than a thousand pages of documents. It's the laugh of someone who has just pulled off the heist of a lifetime, someone who knows they've done something enormously risky but feels, at least for now, untouchable.
The couriers were not unknown
The repentant's words, however precise and detailed, are not enough on their own. The law requires objective evidence, external evidence that confirms the statements made de relato and directly as accomplices. And this is where the Carabinieri investigation by the RONI (National Institute of Criminal Investigation) proves crucial.
Luigi Esposito—one of the two armed brothers who had held the couriers at gunpoint—admitted his participation in the robbery, providing technical details of enormous investigative value in his testimony. He described the Calabrians' cars precisely: "A dark-colored Audi RS-Q3, a sports model with a gasoline engine," and "a gray Fiat Bravo, an older model, a sedan, covered in dirt."
The judicial police investigations confirmed every single detail. Sebastiano Romeo was found to have driven a black Audi RS-Q3 with a German license plate (MUG160). In just over a year, from November 2022 to December 2023, he was stopped driving that vehicle thirteen times in various municipalities in the Locride and Reggio Calabria areas—Locri, Bianco, Siderno, San Luca, and Bovalino—the territory of the Nirta-Strangio clan.
Andrea Giuliani, on the other hand, was behind the wheel of the gray Fiat Bravo with license plate DL 994 ZX, registered in his name. A car that knows the Calabrian roads well, and evidently also those of the Neapolitan hinterland. What's more: in the weeks immediately following the robbery, on April 26 and May 28, 2023, Giuliani had been involved in two separate traffic accidents, both driving that same Fiat Bravo. It's as if those days, even before the arrests, were marked by an uncontrollable anxiety.
But the real problem isn't the drugs. It's who ordered them.
Because according to the informants, that shipment was supposed to reach the Amato-Paganos through Simone "Jet." And when he disappears, someone has to pay. "I think Simone had a big problem with both the Calabrians and the Amato-Paganos," says collaborator Luigi Esposito.
An enormous debt. An impossible responsibility to explain. It's at that moment that the balance of power shifts. "With this affair, Vanella Grassi has moved to us."
A forced choice. Protection in exchange for loyalty.
The story continues far from Naples. Malaga, Porto Banús, Barcelona. That's where the drug brokers operate. After the 2021 arrest of Pasquale Vanacore, known as "El Chapo," Gaetano Angrisano attempted to seize his international contacts. A Moroccan intermediary managed the relationships with major suppliers.
According to his collaborators, he succeeds. "Now Vanella Grassi is the strongest importer of cocaine, tobacco, weed, and heroin." No longer just neighborhoods, but global trafficking.
Investigators searched for confirmation and found it. Sebastiano Romeo was checked thirteen times between Locride and Reggino while driving the very Audi RS Q3 described by the informants. Andrea Giuliani was involved in two car accidents immediately after the robbery while driving a Fiat Bravo registered to him.
The same vehicles. The same men. The same routes. A slowly closing puzzle that, according to the investigating judge, provides a serious and coherent picture of the circumstances. Because that robbery wasn't just a criminal episode.
It's the moment someone realizes that in the cocaine war, there are no longer untouchable suppliers. Only opportunities. And betrayals.
Source EDITORIAL TEAM
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