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Italian mafia boss Bernardo Provenzano, 83, dies in jail | Italian mafia boss Bernardo Provenzano, 83, dies in jail |
(35 minutes later) | |
Italian mafia boss Bernardo Provenzano has died in a prison hospital, aged 83. | |
Provenzano, dubbed "The Tractor" for his ruthless trait of mowing people down, was arrested and jailed in 2006 after spending 43 years on the run. | Provenzano, dubbed "The Tractor" for his ruthless trait of mowing people down, was arrested and jailed in 2006 after spending 43 years on the run. |
He took over command of the Sicilian Mafia in 1993 after the arrest of ex-boss Salvatore "Toto" Riina. | |
Provenzano was serving a life term for several murders, including the 1992 killings of top anti-Mafia judges Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino. | |
He was suffering from bladder cancer and serious cognitive impairment and had spent the last two years in a prison hospital ward, Italian media report. | |
His illnesses had forced the suspension of ongoing negotiations with the state over unresolved crimes. However, even before his health declined, he had resisted any co-operation with the justice system. | |
Who was Bernardo Provenzano? | |
Bernardo Provenzano was born on 31 January 1933 in Corleone, a Sicilian town synonymous with Mafia activity which gave its name to the fictional family in the Godfather films. | |
He was said to have joined the mafia in his late teens, after World War Two. | |
He rose in the Mafia ranks and along with his friend, Toto Riina, worked for mafioso Luciano Liggio, who reportedly once said Provenzano had "the brains of a chicken but shoots like an angel". | |
When in 1974 Liggio was jailed, Riina was left in charge with Provenzano his right-hand man. | |
Once at the helm following Riina's capture, Provenzano reportedly tried to arbitrate between rival Mafia factions competing for business. He was said to have steered away from attacks on high-profile figures that had hardened public opinion against the Mafia and provoked police to respond. | |
Painstakingly cautious about revealing his whereabouts, Provenzano shunned the phone for hand-delivered "pizzini" notes and moved between farmhouses every two or three nights. | |
But in April 2006, he was arrested at a farmhouse near Corleone, his birthplace and where his wife and children lived. |