Rosario Riccobono

Rosario Riccobono (Palermo, February 10, 1929 – Palermo, November 30, 1982) was a member of the Sicilian Mafia. He was the boss of Partanna Mondello, a suburb of Palermo, his native city. In 1974 he became a member of the Sicilian Mafia Commission.

He was involved in heroin trafficking throughout the 1970s and went on the run at the end of that decade after he came under suspicion of running an operation to smuggle heroin from Turkey through Sicily and on to the United States. His right hand man was the future pentito Gaspare Mutolo, who organized massive shipments of heroin.

At one point, in the early 1980s, he was negotiating 500 kilogramme shipments of heroin from Thailand together with Nitto Santapaola from Catania.

As capo mandamento he became a member the Commission, the coordinating body of Cosa Nostra in Sicily, in 1974. He was initially close to other important heroin traffickers such as Stefano Bontade, Salvatore Inzerillo and Gaetano Badalamenti who opposed the rising power of Salvatore Riina and his Corleonesi. He tried to keep a neutral position, but became more and more isolated, trusting his alliance with the head of the Commission Michele Greco, who, however, secretly sided with the Corleonesi.

During the Second Mafia War that broke out in 1981 with the murder of Bontade and Inzerillo, Riccobono expediently sided with the Corleonesi. He lured a number of Stefano Bontade's friends to their deaths on behalf of Riina. Those that went along, such as Emanuele D’Agostino, were never seen again. One of the men he tried to ensnare was Salvatore Contorno, but Contorno was suspicious and fled into hiding. He subsequently went on to become a pentito, cooperating with the government.

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