He refuses to sell drugs and his car is set on fire: "Watch your back." Three arrests.

Battipaglia – He had first said no to drug dealing, then to racketeering. A refusal he paid dearly for, transformed into a nightmare of violence and death threats.

Carabinieri officers from the Battipaglia Company executed an emergency arrest warrant—issued by the District Anti-Mafia Directorate of the Salerno Prosecutor's Office—against three men aged 35, 40, and 48, all originally from the Sele Plain. The charges are extremely serious: extortion, attempted extortion, and arson, all crimes committed in concert and aggravated by the mafia method.

From demands for protection money to burning at the stake in the night

The investigation began at dawn on August 4th on Via Carmine Turco, Battipaglia, following a devastating fire in the forecourt of an apartment building. The flames destroyed three cars belonging to a 52-year-old man from Eboli and his family member. What appeared to be a common arson attack quickly revealed a much more complex and violent motive.

The DDA's investigations uncovered months of suffocating pressure: since January, the victim had been pressured to become a drug dealer for the criminal group. When he was arrested, the gang's demands escalated into pure extortion: €500 a week as "compensation."

The frightened victim had only partially relented, paying €450 in three installments, before stopping all payments in June. A dignified choice that triggered the incendiary retaliation in August.

From electronic bracelet to crack compensation

According to investigators, the man who pulled the strings of the organization was the instigator of the drug trafficking group. The man, despite being under house arrest with an electronic bracelet in the province of Campobasso, continued to manage the territory and launch intimidations through fake social media profiles. He was apparently the one who commissioned the arson attacks from his two accomplices. A disconcerting detail emerged from the investigation: the perpetrator who set fire to the cars was recruited and paid with just 5 grams of crack.

WhatsApp threats and the "curfew" frenzy

The gang's violence didn't stop after the fire. On August 7th, the victim received chilling messages: "From today on, be very careful because I'm suddenly coming..." Then, after a physical altercation between the victim and the arsonist (unwittingly exposed by his own brother), the boss sent a WhatsApp message to the arsonist's brother: the explicit threat to "shoot him in the legs" and the demand for absolute criminal control over the area, even declaring a curfew in Battipaglia.

The escalation was halted by emergency arrests to prevent the suspects from escaping: one of them had a solid network of contacts with criminals in Spain, and all routinely used encrypted communication channels.