Matteo Messina Denaro, a notorious former leader of the Cosa Nostra responsible for massacres and assassinations, has died in prison at the age of 87 after three decades of incarceration.

(ANSA) - ROME, MAR 3 - Cosa Nostra boss Nitto Santapaola died aged 87 on Monday at Milan's Opera prison. Santapaola was believed to have been the mastermind behind many massacres, including the Capaci bombing in May 1992 in which anti-mafia prosecutor Giovanni Falcone, his wife, and three of his bodyguards were killed. Having long been a fugitive of justice, Santapaola was arrested a year later. He was being held under the tough, top-security 41bis jail regime. (ANSA). Read article...

Nitto Santapaola, an 87-year-old boss of the Cosa Nostra mafia, has died in Opera prison in Milan, where he was held under the strict 41bis regime.

Cosa Nostra leader, who controlled most of eastern Sicily, dies while serving multiple life sentences for murder Benedetto “Nitto” Santapaola, a Sicilian mafia boss and one of the most dangerous figures in Italian criminal history, has died aged 87. Santapaola, who was widely believed to have been the architect of a campaign of bloodshed that scarred Italy in the 1980s and 1990s, died on Monday in a Milan prison where he was serving multiple life sentences. An autopsy has been ordered. Conti...

(ANSA) - ROME, MAR 3 - Cosa Nostra boss Nitto Santapaola died aged 87 on Monday at Milan's Opera prison. Santapaola was believed to have been the mastermind behind many massacres, including the Capaci bombing in May 1992 in which anti-mafia prosecutor Giovanni Falcone, his wife, and three of his bodyguards were killed. Having long been a fugitive of justice, Santapaola was arrested a year later. He was being held under the tough, top-security 41bis jail regime. (ANSA). Read article...

One of the most ruthless bosses of the Cosa Nostra, known as 'il cacciatore' (the hunter) or 'il licantropo' (the werewolf), who led the Catania mafia from the late 1970s to early 1990s, has died.