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Excellent Cadavers: The Mafia and the Death of the First Italian Republic
In 1992 Italy was convulsed by two brazen Mafia assassinations of high-ranking officials. The latest "excellent cadavers" were Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino, the Sicilian magistrates who had been the Cosa Nostra's most implacable enemies. Yet in the aftermath of the murders, hundreds of "men of honor" were arrested and the government that ad protected them for nearly half a century was at last driven from office. This is the story that Stille tells with such insight and immediacy in Excellent Cadavers . Combining a profound understanding of his doomed heroes with and unprecedented look into the Mafia's stringent codes and murderous rivalries, he gives us a book that has the power of a great work of history and the suspense of a true thriller.
"Riveting...a well-paced and highly informative account stocked with well-drawn characters."--Philadelphia Inquirer
"Masterful...[Stille] delivers a stiletto-sharp portrait of the bloodthirsty Sicilian mafia."--Business Week
"Riveting...a well-paced and highly informative account stocked with well-drawn characters."--Philadelphia Inquirer
"Masterful...[Stille] delivers a stiletto-sharp portrait of the bloodthirsty Sicilian mafia."--Business Week
480 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1995
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May 6, 2013
This is a non-fiction account about the two Sicilian anti-mafia prosecutors, Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino, who revolutionized the fight against the mafia, who blew the lid off mafia prevalence and off the political connections of the mafia, and who were assassinated by the mob in the early 1990s.
I still feel like shaking when I think about it. This book has been haunting me: on one hand I am in awe of Falcone and Borsellino (and other brave prosecutors and policemen), who pursued this unbelievable investigation (their actions resulted in the maxi-trials of the 1980s) but they starkly stick out (and usually get murdered) in an environment of brutality, fear, and complete corruption of business and government. This book made me incredibly angry, as well. Quite a read.
I still feel like shaking when I think about it. This book has been haunting me: on one hand I am in awe of Falcone and Borsellino (and other brave prosecutors and policemen), who pursued this unbelievable investigation (their actions resulted in the maxi-trials of the 1980s) but they starkly stick out (and usually get murdered) in an environment of brutality, fear, and complete corruption of business and government. This book made me incredibly angry, as well. Quite a read.
October 10, 2015
Alexander Stille's masterfully written and researched story of brave and innovative Italian anti-mafia officials in the police, judiciary and for a brief period, the ministerial offices. The principle figures are the investigating magistrates Giovanni Falcone, and Paolo Borsellino. Falcone had the media spotlight and was the driving force in the Palermo anti-mafia group of magistrates.
After the initial success of the 'maxi-trial' where 500 mafiosi where tried at once, Stille describes the systematic weakening of the anti-mafia group from top political forces from Rome. This included most importantly I think, the sabotage perpetrated by Supreme Court Judge Corrado Carnevale, called the 'sentence-killer'. It was decided that all organized crime cases would go to his section of the court. He freed a great many mafiosi,often on flimsy technicalities. In one instance he freed 100 of 120 convicted members of a criminal ring, 26 of whom had life sentences. The decision to give one section of the court, of which Carnevale was president, all the cases is enough to cast serious suspicions on who made that decision. Carnevale's subsequent performance should prove any doubts. Many considered him, and whoever gave him his powers, to be the fifth column of the mafia, and to be the real godfathers.
Stille focuses much detail on the connections of the mafia with political power. The name at the top is always Giulio Andreotti, who had held all of the most important positions since right after WWII, including prime minister on several occasions. Another person whose name appears in many suspicious instances is that of Bruno Contrada, a Palermo police official who went on to a high position in the Intelligence Services. Falcone voiced his own suspicions about Contrada after a failed attempt on his life, believing that only someone deep inside the Intelligence network could have known about his highly specific plans for the day.
Stille's central purpose in this book is--aside from giving a history of the first anti-mafia prosecutions--to also give us an idea of how deep the problem is. We must ask the question of why so many political figures would risk their reputations to protect heroin dealers and extortionists? Naturally some were getting money but the lion's share was going to the criminals and I doubt that Andreotti was in it for the money. Such a powerful figure in Italian politics had everything he could want from the state expense accounts no doubt. The mafia was able to get votes in Sicily but again if they dismantled the mafia, people would still vote, and at least they could vote without being told who to vote for. Normal political advertising and propaganda could probably get just as many votes, so I don't think those factors were a large enough influence to permit the power and rampant chaos from such a large group of deeply ignorant and destructive people, as the mafia.
Stille avoids this subject but I think we need to look at Italy's role in the geopolitical picture. Geopolitics is principally about the ideologies and power struggles of super powers. Italy had a very strong Communist Party that had been influential in establishing its social safety net of pensions, job security, free health care, education etc. The drug epidemic exploded in Italy in the 1980s as well as in the US, coinciding with the need to fund the Contras and many other proxy wars such as the Islamist anti-Soviet fighters in Afghanistan. Also many wars in Africa, e.g. Angola. Douglas Valentine's seminal works: 'The Strength of the Wolf' and 'The Strength of the Pack' as well as other seminal work on the subject like Gary Webb's 'Dark Alliance', exposes US government complicity in protecting the sources, major suppliers and networks of heroin and cocaine(see my review of Valentine's 'Wolf').
Valentine and others show that these sources cannot and do not operate without the protection of the US, and especially not on the massive level in which they do. While money may not be the prime motivator behind Italian collusion, it is with US involvement because they are using the massive subversive power of the money generated to create a state of controlled chaos and menace, through bribery, to pay proxy armies all over the globe to fight socialism or merely to fight the most basic social advances. The fight is always portrayed as a fight against communism. So while drug rings, especially mid-low level ones are continuously busted, the raw material sources and their political protectors remain untouched.
Monopoly finance capitalists are opposed to publicly funded social programs or anything that gives workers security and more pay. They have nothing to offer except uncertain work terms and debt. Their only method of survival is complete control of political systems, to perpetuate their fraudulent schemes; one of the principle scams being health insurance. Any political system that attempts to destroy that scheme is a mortal enemy.
Tax breaks are of course another central way in which they loot treasuries to bail themselves out of fraud, and so any system that proposes the use of taxes for social safety is their enemy. Productive capitalist enterprises like manufacturing are subservient to finance and expendable, ownership will simply be bought out and factories re-located at will. A company's very existence is useful mainly for its stock value. It doesn't even matter that the company is an American one. None of this is possible without laws that permit such behavior.
The highly corrupt mafia state functions on intimidation and fosters a sense of hopelessness. It is also a system of pure crony capitalism where you take what crumbs are thrown to you and keep your mouth shut. There is no union organizing in mafia-controlled 'legitimate' businesses. The drug money is laundered into all aspects of the economy and in this manner they get a grip on the populace, through complex inter-dependencies, which are in themselves a very effective obstacle to reform. They are allowed to keep their turf and expand into some legitimate businesses while the major corporations and their financial overseers thrive from having essentially co-opted the State.
So we must see Andreotti for what he was--an American puppet. It is a fact that his party, the Christian Democrats, was created by the CIA as a specific anti-communist entity. He was not protecting the mafia out of a deep admiration for them but because he was serving the American foreign policy that used brutal proxy armed groups to keep the populace in a state of fear and confusion. Even though not as overt as a para-military death squad like the Contras, the mafia intimidated the population just as effectively. Indeed, if it ever came to it, I'm certain they would have transformed themselves into a uniformed para-military, for the right price and for the promise of their continued survival.
Stille convincingly shows that the mafia was protected from the very top, despite the honest, courageous efforts of many officials, who mostly all paid for their honesty with their lives.
After the initial success of the 'maxi-trial' where 500 mafiosi where tried at once, Stille describes the systematic weakening of the anti-mafia group from top political forces from Rome. This included most importantly I think, the sabotage perpetrated by Supreme Court Judge Corrado Carnevale, called the 'sentence-killer'. It was decided that all organized crime cases would go to his section of the court. He freed a great many mafiosi,often on flimsy technicalities. In one instance he freed 100 of 120 convicted members of a criminal ring, 26 of whom had life sentences. The decision to give one section of the court, of which Carnevale was president, all the cases is enough to cast serious suspicions on who made that decision. Carnevale's subsequent performance should prove any doubts. Many considered him, and whoever gave him his powers, to be the fifth column of the mafia, and to be the real godfathers.
Stille focuses much detail on the connections of the mafia with political power. The name at the top is always Giulio Andreotti, who had held all of the most important positions since right after WWII, including prime minister on several occasions. Another person whose name appears in many suspicious instances is that of Bruno Contrada, a Palermo police official who went on to a high position in the Intelligence Services. Falcone voiced his own suspicions about Contrada after a failed attempt on his life, believing that only someone deep inside the Intelligence network could have known about his highly specific plans for the day.
Stille's central purpose in this book is--aside from giving a history of the first anti-mafia prosecutions--to also give us an idea of how deep the problem is. We must ask the question of why so many political figures would risk their reputations to protect heroin dealers and extortionists? Naturally some were getting money but the lion's share was going to the criminals and I doubt that Andreotti was in it for the money. Such a powerful figure in Italian politics had everything he could want from the state expense accounts no doubt. The mafia was able to get votes in Sicily but again if they dismantled the mafia, people would still vote, and at least they could vote without being told who to vote for. Normal political advertising and propaganda could probably get just as many votes, so I don't think those factors were a large enough influence to permit the power and rampant chaos from such a large group of deeply ignorant and destructive people, as the mafia.
Stille avoids this subject but I think we need to look at Italy's role in the geopolitical picture. Geopolitics is principally about the ideologies and power struggles of super powers. Italy had a very strong Communist Party that had been influential in establishing its social safety net of pensions, job security, free health care, education etc. The drug epidemic exploded in Italy in the 1980s as well as in the US, coinciding with the need to fund the Contras and many other proxy wars such as the Islamist anti-Soviet fighters in Afghanistan. Also many wars in Africa, e.g. Angola. Douglas Valentine's seminal works: 'The Strength of the Wolf' and 'The Strength of the Pack' as well as other seminal work on the subject like Gary Webb's 'Dark Alliance', exposes US government complicity in protecting the sources, major suppliers and networks of heroin and cocaine(see my review of Valentine's 'Wolf').
Valentine and others show that these sources cannot and do not operate without the protection of the US, and especially not on the massive level in which they do. While money may not be the prime motivator behind Italian collusion, it is with US involvement because they are using the massive subversive power of the money generated to create a state of controlled chaos and menace, through bribery, to pay proxy armies all over the globe to fight socialism or merely to fight the most basic social advances. The fight is always portrayed as a fight against communism. So while drug rings, especially mid-low level ones are continuously busted, the raw material sources and their political protectors remain untouched.
Monopoly finance capitalists are opposed to publicly funded social programs or anything that gives workers security and more pay. They have nothing to offer except uncertain work terms and debt. Their only method of survival is complete control of political systems, to perpetuate their fraudulent schemes; one of the principle scams being health insurance. Any political system that attempts to destroy that scheme is a mortal enemy.
Tax breaks are of course another central way in which they loot treasuries to bail themselves out of fraud, and so any system that proposes the use of taxes for social safety is their enemy. Productive capitalist enterprises like manufacturing are subservient to finance and expendable, ownership will simply be bought out and factories re-located at will. A company's very existence is useful mainly for its stock value. It doesn't even matter that the company is an American one. None of this is possible without laws that permit such behavior.
The highly corrupt mafia state functions on intimidation and fosters a sense of hopelessness. It is also a system of pure crony capitalism where you take what crumbs are thrown to you and keep your mouth shut. There is no union organizing in mafia-controlled 'legitimate' businesses. The drug money is laundered into all aspects of the economy and in this manner they get a grip on the populace, through complex inter-dependencies, which are in themselves a very effective obstacle to reform. They are allowed to keep their turf and expand into some legitimate businesses while the major corporations and their financial overseers thrive from having essentially co-opted the State.
So we must see Andreotti for what he was--an American puppet. It is a fact that his party, the Christian Democrats, was created by the CIA as a specific anti-communist entity. He was not protecting the mafia out of a deep admiration for them but because he was serving the American foreign policy that used brutal proxy armed groups to keep the populace in a state of fear and confusion. Even though not as overt as a para-military death squad like the Contras, the mafia intimidated the population just as effectively. Indeed, if it ever came to it, I'm certain they would have transformed themselves into a uniformed para-military, for the right price and for the promise of their continued survival.
Stille convincingly shows that the mafia was protected from the very top, despite the honest, courageous efforts of many officials, who mostly all paid for their honesty with their lives.
November 5, 2022
I vividly remember a holiday I spent in Sicily in May 1992, as our journey from the airport took us along the motorway which still bore traces of the terrible attack on Judge Giovanni Falcone. I was therefore pleased to discover this book dealing with the events of which the attack was a key moment.
This is a carefully researched and smoothly written account of how a small team of Italian judges developed and implemented a strategy to tackle the Mafia. Despite numerous obstructions from both inside and outside the judicial and political system, they brought about the significant ‘Maxi trials’ of Palermo. Ultimately their success led to the assassination of their leading figures, but these crimes themselves proved a major weapon in curbing the Mafia’s power.
This was an interesting but rather dry book - not the fault of the author, who deals very well with his subject matter, but rather a consequence of the topic itself. The book reaches a compelling and dramatic climax with the killings of Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino, but much of the time leading up to it is concerned with analysing judicial reports, taking witness statements and managing political infighting, and this is necessarily repetitive and sometimes dull.
However, the author has a smooth and accessible writing style and has skilfully captured the underlying issues that allowed the Mafia to thrive for so long, as well as the interconnected developments that brought about the downfall of the Mafia bosses and their political defenders. Overall, an interesting piece of non fiction but I wouldn’t agree with those reviewers who said it read like a novel.
This is a carefully researched and smoothly written account of how a small team of Italian judges developed and implemented a strategy to tackle the Mafia. Despite numerous obstructions from both inside and outside the judicial and political system, they brought about the significant ‘Maxi trials’ of Palermo. Ultimately their success led to the assassination of their leading figures, but these crimes themselves proved a major weapon in curbing the Mafia’s power.
This was an interesting but rather dry book - not the fault of the author, who deals very well with his subject matter, but rather a consequence of the topic itself. The book reaches a compelling and dramatic climax with the killings of Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino, but much of the time leading up to it is concerned with analysing judicial reports, taking witness statements and managing political infighting, and this is necessarily repetitive and sometimes dull.
However, the author has a smooth and accessible writing style and has skilfully captured the underlying issues that allowed the Mafia to thrive for so long, as well as the interconnected developments that brought about the downfall of the Mafia bosses and their political defenders. Overall, an interesting piece of non fiction but I wouldn’t agree with those reviewers who said it read like a novel.
December 21, 2015
I really liked reading this book, it was a lot of fun to follow all of the drama etc. But more than that it did an interesting job describing the mafia as a social formation that exhibited crises of reproduction, the resolution of which being contingent on the social environment. Basically it describes, from the perspective of the local law enforcement, the rise of a faction that was about to rise to power by stepping up the level of violence that it exhibited, but in a way that drew attention to its competitors. This dynamic accelerated the cycles of extreme violence, public backlash, and political dispersion of the backlash, never quite leaving the whole back where it started.
The political dimension is the most interesting. It is the thing that the mafia witnesses are the least willing to talk about, generally feeling that the upheaval that would result from revelations about the political class would sink any organized approach to the problems that the development of the mafia poses. This is borne out a number of times, twice within the narrative and then at the close of the book as the Berlusconi regime begins to rev up. The political dimension is clearly a source of stability for the mafia groups, and the impression that I got while reading it is that the political dimension is crucial for the reproduction of the mafia itself, the mafia forming part of the mediation between sectors of the political class and the public they represent, enforcers of those who will assent to their enforcement.
The difficulty that this political dimension poses is made clear in almost every instance when Falcone decides to collaborate with groups with known mafia interests or even personal interests that are agnostic of the mafia. He is sidetracked and led down blind alleys. In reaction to this he proceeds by totally ignoring the political dimension to the best of his ability, believing that being able to continue working is the most important thing. Ironically, this appears to succeed only when he moves away from Sicily entirely and moves to consolidate and centralize the anti-mafia effort in Rome.
Another interesting point presented, presumably not on purpose since the author appears to be some kind of smug liberal, is the larger scale of the political dimension. The author directly states that the war on the mafia was positively aided by the fall of communism, with the disempowerment of the PCI ending the left wing "threat" that the mafia were supposedly the lesser evil of. What this implies is that fighting the mafia only became politically acceptable when it became a problem for the bourgeoisie. The majority of the prosecutions before the 90s appeared to center around drug offenses, with the effective theft from public funds being totally unapproachable. Once the 90s rolled around and public assets began to be privatized all of a sudden there was political impetus to do something about it. To take this a step further, it could be inferred that the siphoning off of money from public services was actually in the interest of the bourgeoisie. This then makes the "paradox" of Andreotti, presented as the powerhouse behind postwar Italian politics, personally engaging with powerful mafia figures make much more sense. It also resituates the mafia from being some sort of font of political power to an agent that plays a political role, reclaiming proceeds of the social-democratic welfare state for the bourgeoisie. I don't know if I've thought this through totally but I might even go so far as to say that it could represent a sort of illicit labor aristocracy. Of course this is barely touched on in the book, instead the author has a bunch of quotes from neofascists.
The political dimension is the most interesting. It is the thing that the mafia witnesses are the least willing to talk about, generally feeling that the upheaval that would result from revelations about the political class would sink any organized approach to the problems that the development of the mafia poses. This is borne out a number of times, twice within the narrative and then at the close of the book as the Berlusconi regime begins to rev up. The political dimension is clearly a source of stability for the mafia groups, and the impression that I got while reading it is that the political dimension is crucial for the reproduction of the mafia itself, the mafia forming part of the mediation between sectors of the political class and the public they represent, enforcers of those who will assent to their enforcement.
The difficulty that this political dimension poses is made clear in almost every instance when Falcone decides to collaborate with groups with known mafia interests or even personal interests that are agnostic of the mafia. He is sidetracked and led down blind alleys. In reaction to this he proceeds by totally ignoring the political dimension to the best of his ability, believing that being able to continue working is the most important thing. Ironically, this appears to succeed only when he moves away from Sicily entirely and moves to consolidate and centralize the anti-mafia effort in Rome.
Another interesting point presented, presumably not on purpose since the author appears to be some kind of smug liberal, is the larger scale of the political dimension. The author directly states that the war on the mafia was positively aided by the fall of communism, with the disempowerment of the PCI ending the left wing "threat" that the mafia were supposedly the lesser evil of. What this implies is that fighting the mafia only became politically acceptable when it became a problem for the bourgeoisie. The majority of the prosecutions before the 90s appeared to center around drug offenses, with the effective theft from public funds being totally unapproachable. Once the 90s rolled around and public assets began to be privatized all of a sudden there was political impetus to do something about it. To take this a step further, it could be inferred that the siphoning off of money from public services was actually in the interest of the bourgeoisie. This then makes the "paradox" of Andreotti, presented as the powerhouse behind postwar Italian politics, personally engaging with powerful mafia figures make much more sense. It also resituates the mafia from being some sort of font of political power to an agent that plays a political role, reclaiming proceeds of the social-democratic welfare state for the bourgeoisie. I don't know if I've thought this through totally but I might even go so far as to say that it could represent a sort of illicit labor aristocracy. Of course this is barely touched on in the book, instead the author has a bunch of quotes from neofascists.
January 28, 2016
For an in depth look at La Cosa Nostra and the government corruption that still rots away at Italy's soul, Alexander Stille's excellent 1995 opus is a must read! The term "Excellent Cadavers" refers to the government officials who have been killed in the fight against the mafia rather than rival mafiosi or private citizens who have wound up dead. As the title suggests, "Excellent Cadavers" reads at times like a thriller, at others like a hard-boiled detective novel, and at yet others like an investigative report and autopsy into a country afflicted with disease. The disease in this case refers to decades of government corruption, bribery scandals, and political wrangling.
What Stille's book really is though is a tribute to all those who long waged a thankless and, at times, seemingly hopeless fight for justice against the mafia and its masters in government. Stille spotlights two men in particular, Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino. Sicilian through and through, Falcone and Borsellino went up against nothing more than the entire Italian State in order to bring justice to the cruel and vicious mafiosi that had become as much a part of the Sicilian landscape as the arancini and cannoli the Italian island is more positively renowned for.
The research that Stille did in order to write this incredible book is a feat in itself, and that the quality of the writing should be as high as it is makes "Excellent Cadavers" an absolute must! In this age of "The Sopranos" and Martin Scorsese, it's books like Stille's that remind us that there is nothing remotely romantic or glamorous about the real mafia.
What Stille's book really is though is a tribute to all those who long waged a thankless and, at times, seemingly hopeless fight for justice against the mafia and its masters in government. Stille spotlights two men in particular, Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino. Sicilian through and through, Falcone and Borsellino went up against nothing more than the entire Italian State in order to bring justice to the cruel and vicious mafiosi that had become as much a part of the Sicilian landscape as the arancini and cannoli the Italian island is more positively renowned for.
The research that Stille did in order to write this incredible book is a feat in itself, and that the quality of the writing should be as high as it is makes "Excellent Cadavers" an absolute must! In this age of "The Sopranos" and Martin Scorsese, it's books like Stille's that remind us that there is nothing remotely romantic or glamorous about the real mafia.
December 13, 2021
This was the mafia book I wanted to read. Less in the line of sociological study and more in the line of a linear history which gets us to the men in the trenches so to say. The killers, police and the prosecutors all get their dues here. This one has Giovanni Falcone as its principal character, he was the excellent cadaver. Who took the mafia down more or less. It's still there of course, but the Italian state it is currently living in is very different. One which is willing and able to take them down.
December 10, 2011
Screw "The Godfather", read this instead
December 8, 2020
This was an absolutely gripping and thoughtful read.
March 31, 2020
Phenomenal, moving and in-depth look at the noxious effects of Cosa Nostra in Sicily and the efforts of a host of brave Italians, and in particular Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino, in attempting to fight them.
Falcone and Borsellino were above all Sicilians with a deep abiding desire to rid their home of the mafia. Stille painstakingly and forensically traces the development of their careers and the sophisticated legal approach they took, which culminated in the maxi-trial in Palermo. This was unbelievably the first time the Italian legal system officially acknowledged the existence of a formalised mafia with established protocols and organisational structures, rather than simply dismissing it as a shadowy essential part of the Sicilian psyche.
In his account, the personalities of Borsellino and Falcone really come out. He does not attempt to deify them, but presents them as they were: two deeply principled men who had their flaws and made their mistakes. Their unceasing and unflinching courage in the face of huge personal danger and a rotten Italian political system built on the edifice of an alliance between the Christian Democracts and the mafia is nothing less than inspiring.
Stille anchors his narrative in an analysis of postwar Italian politics. His fundamental contention is that the Christian Democracts, the dominant force of postwar Italian politcs, were propped up by a combination of the Mafia, who secured vote blocks for them using violence and intimidation, and indulgence from the United States who viewed them as a valuable bulwark against Communism. That credible accusations were made against a Supreme court judge, Corrado 'the sentence killer' Carnevale, and Giulio Andreotti, the dominant figure of Italian postwar politics shows what Falcone and Borsellino were fighting against. They sadly paid with their lives.
This is certainly a dense book, but one well worth reading. You'll come away deeply sad and angry but perhaps most of all inspired.
Falcone and Borsellino were above all Sicilians with a deep abiding desire to rid their home of the mafia. Stille painstakingly and forensically traces the development of their careers and the sophisticated legal approach they took, which culminated in the maxi-trial in Palermo. This was unbelievably the first time the Italian legal system officially acknowledged the existence of a formalised mafia with established protocols and organisational structures, rather than simply dismissing it as a shadowy essential part of the Sicilian psyche.
In his account, the personalities of Borsellino and Falcone really come out. He does not attempt to deify them, but presents them as they were: two deeply principled men who had their flaws and made their mistakes. Their unceasing and unflinching courage in the face of huge personal danger and a rotten Italian political system built on the edifice of an alliance between the Christian Democracts and the mafia is nothing less than inspiring.
Stille anchors his narrative in an analysis of postwar Italian politics. His fundamental contention is that the Christian Democracts, the dominant force of postwar Italian politcs, were propped up by a combination of the Mafia, who secured vote blocks for them using violence and intimidation, and indulgence from the United States who viewed them as a valuable bulwark against Communism. That credible accusations were made against a Supreme court judge, Corrado 'the sentence killer' Carnevale, and Giulio Andreotti, the dominant figure of Italian postwar politics shows what Falcone and Borsellino were fighting against. They sadly paid with their lives.
This is certainly a dense book, but one well worth reading. You'll come away deeply sad and angry but perhaps most of all inspired.
September 13, 2023
good source for more about
Giuseppe "Pippo" Calò (30 September 1931) is an Italian mobster and member of the Sicilian Mafia in Porta Nuova. He was referred to as the cassiere di Cosa Nostra ("cashier of Cosa Nostra") because he was heavily involved in the financial side of organized crime, primarily money laundering.
He was arrested in 1985 and charged with ordering the murder of Roberto Calvi – nicknamed il banchiere di Dio ("the banker of God") – of the Banco Ambrosiano in 1982, but was acquitted in 2007 due to "insufficient evidence" in a surprise verdict.
After Calò was sentenced to 23 years' imprisonment as part of the 1986/87 Maxi Trial, he was sentenced to life imprisonment in 1989 for organising the 1984 Train 904 bombing. He was given several further life sentences between 1995 and 2002.
........
Boss of the Porta Nuova Mafia family
Born and raised in Palermo, the capital of Sicily, he was inducted into the Porta Nuova Mafia family at the age of 23 after carrying out a murder to avenge his father. By 1969, he was the boss of Porta Nuova, and amongst his men was the future informant (pentito) Tommaso Buscetta. Calò was on the Sicilian Mafia Commission, a group of the most powerful Mafia bosses in Sicily who regularly met, supposedly to iron out differences and solve disputes.
In the beginning of the 1970s, Calò moved to Rome. Under the guise of an antiques dealer and under the false identity of Mario Agliarolo he invested in real estate and laundered large proceeds of crime for many Mafia families.
He was able to establish close links with common criminals of the Banda della Magliana, neo-fascist groups and members of the Italian intelligence agencies. According to reports, in the mid-1970s Calò strengthened relations with historical bosses of the Neapolitan Camorra, such as Lorenzo Nuvoletta and Vincenzo Lubrano.
During the early 1980s, he supported Salvatore Riina and the Corleonesi during the Second Mafia War that decimated the rival Mafia families. During the war, Giuseppe Calò personally took part in the murder of his former best friend Tommaso Buscetta's sons in September 1981, as well as the killings of Palermo bosses Rosario Riccobono and Salvatore Scaglione on November 30, 1982.
........
Bombing of 904 express train
Calò arranged the bombing of the 904 express train between Florence and Bologna on 23 December 1984 that killed 16 people and injured 267 others.
It was meant to divert attention from the revelations given by various Mafia informants, including Buscetta. Calò and his men had joined up with neo-fascist terrorists and the Camorra boss Giuseppe Misso to carry out the attack.
........
Murder of Roberto Calvi
In July 1991 the Mafia pentito (a mafioso turned informer) Francesco Marino Mannoia claimed that Roberto Calvi – nicknamed "God's banker" because he was in charge of Banco Ambrosiano, in which the Vatican Bank was the main share-holder – had been killed in 1982 because he had lost Mafia funds when the Banco Ambrosiano collapsed.
According to Mannoia the killer was Francesco Di Carlo, a mafioso living in London at the time, and the order to kill Calvi had come from Calò and Licio Gelli, the head of the secret Italian masonic lodge Propaganda Due.
When Di Carlo became an informer in June 1996, he denied that he was the killer, but admitted that he had been approached by Calò to do the job. However, Di Carlo could not be reached in time, and when he later called Calò, the latter said that everything had been taken care of already.
In 1997, Italian prosecutors in Rome implicated Calò in Calvi's murder, along with Flavio Carboni, a Sardinian businessman with wide ranging interests, as well as Ernesto Diotallevi (one of the leaders of the Banda della Magliana, a Roman Mafia-like organization) and Di Carlo.
In July 2003, the prosecution concluded that the Mafia acted not only in its own interests, but also to ensure that Calvi could not blackmail "politico-institutional figures and [representatives] of freemasonry, the P2 lodge, and the Institute for the Works of Religion with whom he had invested substantial sums of money, some of it from Cosa Nostra and Italian public corporations".
The trial finally began in October 2005.[10]
In March 2007, prosecutor Luca Tescaroli requested life sentences for the already convicted Pippo Calò, Flavio Carboni, Ernesto Diotallevi and Calvi's bodyguard Silvano Vittor. All of them deny involvement.
Tescaroli began his conclusions by saying Calvi was killed "to punish him for taking large quantities of money from criminal organisations and especially the Mafia organisation known as the 'Cosa Nostra'".
.........
Dissociation from the Mafia
In September 2001, in the course of the trial of the Via D'Amelio bombing that killed judge Paolo Borsellino and his escort, Pippo Calò declared he dissociated from Cosa Nostra.
In an extraordinary statement he admitted Cosa Nostra existed and that he had been part of its Commission – breaking the law of silence or omertà.
However, he did not become a pentito, and refused to testify against his fellow mafiosi. Calò said he was prepared to face his own responsibility but would not name others. "I am a mafioso but I don't want to be accused of bloodbaths", he said.
Giuseppe "Pippo" Calò (30 September 1931) is an Italian mobster and member of the Sicilian Mafia in Porta Nuova. He was referred to as the cassiere di Cosa Nostra ("cashier of Cosa Nostra") because he was heavily involved in the financial side of organized crime, primarily money laundering.
He was arrested in 1985 and charged with ordering the murder of Roberto Calvi – nicknamed il banchiere di Dio ("the banker of God") – of the Banco Ambrosiano in 1982, but was acquitted in 2007 due to "insufficient evidence" in a surprise verdict.
After Calò was sentenced to 23 years' imprisonment as part of the 1986/87 Maxi Trial, he was sentenced to life imprisonment in 1989 for organising the 1984 Train 904 bombing. He was given several further life sentences between 1995 and 2002.
........
Boss of the Porta Nuova Mafia family
Born and raised in Palermo, the capital of Sicily, he was inducted into the Porta Nuova Mafia family at the age of 23 after carrying out a murder to avenge his father. By 1969, he was the boss of Porta Nuova, and amongst his men was the future informant (pentito) Tommaso Buscetta. Calò was on the Sicilian Mafia Commission, a group of the most powerful Mafia bosses in Sicily who regularly met, supposedly to iron out differences and solve disputes.
In the beginning of the 1970s, Calò moved to Rome. Under the guise of an antiques dealer and under the false identity of Mario Agliarolo he invested in real estate and laundered large proceeds of crime for many Mafia families.
He was able to establish close links with common criminals of the Banda della Magliana, neo-fascist groups and members of the Italian intelligence agencies. According to reports, in the mid-1970s Calò strengthened relations with historical bosses of the Neapolitan Camorra, such as Lorenzo Nuvoletta and Vincenzo Lubrano.
During the early 1980s, he supported Salvatore Riina and the Corleonesi during the Second Mafia War that decimated the rival Mafia families. During the war, Giuseppe Calò personally took part in the murder of his former best friend Tommaso Buscetta's sons in September 1981, as well as the killings of Palermo bosses Rosario Riccobono and Salvatore Scaglione on November 30, 1982.
........
Bombing of 904 express train
Calò arranged the bombing of the 904 express train between Florence and Bologna on 23 December 1984 that killed 16 people and injured 267 others.
It was meant to divert attention from the revelations given by various Mafia informants, including Buscetta. Calò and his men had joined up with neo-fascist terrorists and the Camorra boss Giuseppe Misso to carry out the attack.
........
Murder of Roberto Calvi
In July 1991 the Mafia pentito (a mafioso turned informer) Francesco Marino Mannoia claimed that Roberto Calvi – nicknamed "God's banker" because he was in charge of Banco Ambrosiano, in which the Vatican Bank was the main share-holder – had been killed in 1982 because he had lost Mafia funds when the Banco Ambrosiano collapsed.
According to Mannoia the killer was Francesco Di Carlo, a mafioso living in London at the time, and the order to kill Calvi had come from Calò and Licio Gelli, the head of the secret Italian masonic lodge Propaganda Due.
When Di Carlo became an informer in June 1996, he denied that he was the killer, but admitted that he had been approached by Calò to do the job. However, Di Carlo could not be reached in time, and when he later called Calò, the latter said that everything had been taken care of already.
In 1997, Italian prosecutors in Rome implicated Calò in Calvi's murder, along with Flavio Carboni, a Sardinian businessman with wide ranging interests, as well as Ernesto Diotallevi (one of the leaders of the Banda della Magliana, a Roman Mafia-like organization) and Di Carlo.
In July 2003, the prosecution concluded that the Mafia acted not only in its own interests, but also to ensure that Calvi could not blackmail "politico-institutional figures and [representatives] of freemasonry, the P2 lodge, and the Institute for the Works of Religion with whom he had invested substantial sums of money, some of it from Cosa Nostra and Italian public corporations".
The trial finally began in October 2005.[10]
In March 2007, prosecutor Luca Tescaroli requested life sentences for the already convicted Pippo Calò, Flavio Carboni, Ernesto Diotallevi and Calvi's bodyguard Silvano Vittor. All of them deny involvement.
Tescaroli began his conclusions by saying Calvi was killed "to punish him for taking large quantities of money from criminal organisations and especially the Mafia organisation known as the 'Cosa Nostra'".
.........
Dissociation from the Mafia
In September 2001, in the course of the trial of the Via D'Amelio bombing that killed judge Paolo Borsellino and his escort, Pippo Calò declared he dissociated from Cosa Nostra.
In an extraordinary statement he admitted Cosa Nostra existed and that he had been part of its Commission – breaking the law of silence or omertà.
However, he did not become a pentito, and refused to testify against his fellow mafiosi. Calò said he was prepared to face his own responsibility but would not name others. "I am a mafioso but I don't want to be accused of bloodbaths", he said.
gave-up
October 26, 2023Did not realize it was possible for a book about the mafia with a dead guy on the cover to be so boring
September 6, 2021
This is a pretty insane story but I didn't really connect with the writing. Overall this was a bit dense and dry. 3 stars.
August 12, 2012
"Excellent Cadavers" is probably the best mob story you've never heard.
Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino, two heroic Italian prosecutors, mounted an extraordinary legal campaign against the Sicilian mafia during the 1980s. They ultimately paid for their efforts with their lives. But their untimely murders shook Italy so hard they toppled its government. Theirs is a compelling story, full of unforgettable characters, and all of it is tragic and true. And chances are high that you don't know much about it.
Why? Probably because it is about prosecutors. Prosecutors are not sexy. Prosecutors are, almost by definition, uncool. And popular culture is all about cool. Pop culture loves Henry Hill in "Goodfellas," Michael Corleone in "The Godfather" and Tony Montana in "Scarface." Popular culture loves bad guys.
Bad guys may be bad, but they are also cool. They get drunk and do mountains of coke and pull guns on one another and get into situations that are crazy and compelling; they're not likable, but they're always watchable. Good guys, by contrast, seem boring--they're the ones busting up the party the bad guys invited us to. We sometimes admire the good guys from a distance, but it is easier to feel dingy in the light of their halos. Still, we don't necessarily want to be them--they work hard and go home to their wives and live boring lives.
Except for Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino.
These men were hard workers, yes, but they worked in a truly topsy-turvy world where good was bad and bad was good, where government was riddled with corruption and graft, where outlaws clung to strange codes of behavior whereby killing someone was fine but swearing in front of a woman was unacceptable. In southern Italy in the 1980s, an estimated 10,000 people died in mob-related violence, but fathers sometimes didn't report the murders of their sons to the local police, for fear of retribution.
Amidst such lawlessness, Falcone and Borsellino put together the Palermo maxi-trial, a titanic anti-mafia case that required the construction of an elaborate concrete bunker courtroom and ultimately led to an incredible 344 convictions. Stille recounts the events leading up to this trial with an eye for detail but also the ability to step back and encapsulate the detail; he never fails to see the forest for the trees. Writing about the eve of the maxi-trial, he describes how the prosecutors and their families were confined for their own safety on an island known as "the Alcatraz of Italy." It was, Stille writes, "a telling indication of the upside-down nature of life in Sicily on the eve of the maxi-trial: mafia fugitives moved freely about Palermo while government prosecutors had to live in prison for their own protection."
Fighting the good fight put both men in a bad spot with both the lawbreakers and the lawmakers. Falcone was maneuvered out of his position in Palermo and ultimately assassinated; Borsellino was killed six months later. But their death lead to their greatest triumphs, for their murders awakened a nation to the corruption of the ruling Christian Democrats and caused the downfall of Italy's First Republic.
Ultimately, Stille's book is great not because he tells this story, but because he makes us care. Falcone and Borsellino come off as principled but pragmatic, saintly but shrewd; Stille makes their goodness real and compelling. If you're anything like me, you'll read this and hope someone makes it into a miniseries; you will find yourself rooting for the good guys, and realizing that good guys still exist; you will weep at their deaths, and their ultimate victory.
Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino, two heroic Italian prosecutors, mounted an extraordinary legal campaign against the Sicilian mafia during the 1980s. They ultimately paid for their efforts with their lives. But their untimely murders shook Italy so hard they toppled its government. Theirs is a compelling story, full of unforgettable characters, and all of it is tragic and true. And chances are high that you don't know much about it.
Why? Probably because it is about prosecutors. Prosecutors are not sexy. Prosecutors are, almost by definition, uncool. And popular culture is all about cool. Pop culture loves Henry Hill in "Goodfellas," Michael Corleone in "The Godfather" and Tony Montana in "Scarface." Popular culture loves bad guys.
Bad guys may be bad, but they are also cool. They get drunk and do mountains of coke and pull guns on one another and get into situations that are crazy and compelling; they're not likable, but they're always watchable. Good guys, by contrast, seem boring--they're the ones busting up the party the bad guys invited us to. We sometimes admire the good guys from a distance, but it is easier to feel dingy in the light of their halos. Still, we don't necessarily want to be them--they work hard and go home to their wives and live boring lives.
Except for Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino.
These men were hard workers, yes, but they worked in a truly topsy-turvy world where good was bad and bad was good, where government was riddled with corruption and graft, where outlaws clung to strange codes of behavior whereby killing someone was fine but swearing in front of a woman was unacceptable. In southern Italy in the 1980s, an estimated 10,000 people died in mob-related violence, but fathers sometimes didn't report the murders of their sons to the local police, for fear of retribution.
Amidst such lawlessness, Falcone and Borsellino put together the Palermo maxi-trial, a titanic anti-mafia case that required the construction of an elaborate concrete bunker courtroom and ultimately led to an incredible 344 convictions. Stille recounts the events leading up to this trial with an eye for detail but also the ability to step back and encapsulate the detail; he never fails to see the forest for the trees. Writing about the eve of the maxi-trial, he describes how the prosecutors and their families were confined for their own safety on an island known as "the Alcatraz of Italy." It was, Stille writes, "a telling indication of the upside-down nature of life in Sicily on the eve of the maxi-trial: mafia fugitives moved freely about Palermo while government prosecutors had to live in prison for their own protection."
Fighting the good fight put both men in a bad spot with both the lawbreakers and the lawmakers. Falcone was maneuvered out of his position in Palermo and ultimately assassinated; Borsellino was killed six months later. But their death lead to their greatest triumphs, for their murders awakened a nation to the corruption of the ruling Christian Democrats and caused the downfall of Italy's First Republic.
Ultimately, Stille's book is great not because he tells this story, but because he makes us care. Falcone and Borsellino come off as principled but pragmatic, saintly but shrewd; Stille makes their goodness real and compelling. If you're anything like me, you'll read this and hope someone makes it into a miniseries; you will find yourself rooting for the good guys, and realizing that good guys still exist; you will weep at their deaths, and their ultimate victory.
January 30, 2018
Everything you wanted to know about the prosecution of the mafia in Italy, plus about 400 more pages. This book is dense, but the writing is captivating, flows naturally, and by about page 300, becomes a story you have trouble putting down.
October 22, 2021
Probably the definitive book on the Sicilian Mafia in its heyday, including the Corleone uprising, Luciano Leggio, Toto Riina, Bernardo Provenzano (although not much on him), etc. And obviously tons on Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino, and how they had to struggle to achieve their results, more so against other politicians than against the mafia itself (even though the mafia was definitely trying to dissuade them, and succeeded in killing them in the end).
Incredible how the mafia had taken hold in Sicily. The stories about the priest killer who would give last rites to men after killing them, or the politicians, judges, police officers involved, or just how ordinary citizens were all involved (middle aged ladies from Torretta were used as mules to bring heroin to the US), or how the imprisoned Mafia bosses all got leave to stay in the hospital for 'tests' that continued on and on; the hospital being owned by the brother of a corrupt politician, they had run of the mill there, had people visit them, and even had underlings moved there to act as servants.
Particularly unnerving was also reading about "fake turncoats", like Pellegriti. Already serving life in prison, he suddenly confessed to various conspiracies involving a (corrupt) politician, which turned out to be false. Turns out he was spreading disinformation, trying to muddy the waters of the other information obtained.
Cosa Nostra would also spread disinformation about important people they murdered, both before and after murdering them. This was because if an upstanding member of society is murdered, people are outraged, but if there are rumors and newspaper articles about that person being corrupt, having affairs, making deals with criminals, etc., then they will be much more accepting of his murder.
5 stars. Also I see a movie was made with the same name. I should probably check it out.
Incredible how the mafia had taken hold in Sicily. The stories about the priest killer who would give last rites to men after killing them, or the politicians, judges, police officers involved, or just how ordinary citizens were all involved (middle aged ladies from Torretta were used as mules to bring heroin to the US), or how the imprisoned Mafia bosses all got leave to stay in the hospital for 'tests' that continued on and on; the hospital being owned by the brother of a corrupt politician, they had run of the mill there, had people visit them, and even had underlings moved there to act as servants.
Particularly unnerving was also reading about "fake turncoats", like Pellegriti. Already serving life in prison, he suddenly confessed to various conspiracies involving a (corrupt) politician, which turned out to be false. Turns out he was spreading disinformation, trying to muddy the waters of the other information obtained.
Cosa Nostra would also spread disinformation about important people they murdered, both before and after murdering them. This was because if an upstanding member of society is murdered, people are outraged, but if there are rumors and newspaper articles about that person being corrupt, having affairs, making deals with criminals, etc., then they will be much more accepting of his murder.
5 stars. Also I see a movie was made with the same name. I should probably check it out.
September 28, 2020
After finishing this book, I sat in stunned silence. It has been an emotional journey of tragedy and the brutality of organized crime stemmed from the void of debased nature of humankind, left to fester and thrive in the aftermath of war. The total failure of the Italian government and its people towards a collection of individuals who paid with their lives against what was an invisible war for far too long. The complexity of great minds, the selfless sacrifice and the intensity of living on borrowed time is gripping. Not being Italian, I too felt the genuine heart break of Falcone and Borsellino and their close network of family and friends as they were continuously undermined, challenged and abandoned and yet- their need to go on. Living with death above the door and still finding the strength to do good among such darkness shows heroes that today we struggle to find.
Stille has pieced together a horror story and turned it to a testimony of the work of the two judges. While this history invokes shame in the hearts of italians, it also inspires pride that there is still hope in justice. The list of Excellent Cadavers is seemingly endless. A must read for those interested in history, the works of organized crime, development of justice and also for those who seek proof that true heroes really can exist.
Stille has pieced together a horror story and turned it to a testimony of the work of the two judges. While this history invokes shame in the hearts of italians, it also inspires pride that there is still hope in justice. The list of Excellent Cadavers is seemingly endless. A must read for those interested in history, the works of organized crime, development of justice and also for those who seek proof that true heroes really can exist.
January 21, 2023
One challenge of any recent telling of history is the often overwhelming number of real characters that are pivotal to the story. The author manages this very well - keeping the reader engaged by reminding us quickly who the personages are as they reappear in this ongoing war against the Cosa Nostra. I had no idea how deeply entwined the Mafia was in the political power of Italy, all the way up to Prime Minister Andreotti - who served seven terms. Italy was a corrupt basket case of murder, corruption and bribery. I don't know where Falcone and Borsellino found the courage, genius and persistence to fight the Mafia before being brutally murdered. They often joked acerbically they were walking corpses. The tendrils of Mafia reached pretty clearly into NYC of the 1990s - which is chillingly portrayed in the Netflix series FEAR CITY. I chose this book because of the surfeit of books on beautiful Italian food and the Roman Empire - I wanted something more recent and more modern. I got more than I asked for - wow - the cruelty and orchestrated chaos is just chilling. A revelation that as the Mafia became more and more violent, it was sign of its demise and internecine cannabilism is fascinating.
December 21, 2019
The most horrifying book I have ever read, Excellent Cadavers is a detailed and dry account of the events related to the investigations carried out by prosecutors Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino. I would recommend this book to anyone who is only familiarised with the romanticised depiction of the Italian mafia that Hollywood has popularised with films like "The Godfather" and want a glimpse into the real mafia. But I should warn it is a very depressing read, as it seems from this book that the inevitable end of every single well-intended prosecutor who dares to investigate the mafia is the same.
February 9, 2025
I couldn't finish this. There is just too much detail like, one Italian who did this then another Italian did this in retaliation.
There are endless Italian names mentioned.
I'm not massively interested in the mafia and I guess I was hoping for more of a non fiction but interesting stories rather than a blow by blow account of the judicial system and killings on one side then the other and the consequences of that.
Just wasn't grabbing me... and it's a long book.
I prefer to be engaged and enjoying a book rather than reading , what I felt was a very uninteresting account of progress of the mafia.
There are endless Italian names mentioned.
I'm not massively interested in the mafia and I guess I was hoping for more of a non fiction but interesting stories rather than a blow by blow account of the judicial system and killings on one side then the other and the consequences of that.
Just wasn't grabbing me... and it's a long book.
I prefer to be engaged and enjoying a book rather than reading , what I felt was a very uninteresting account of progress of the mafia.
December 8, 2024
Super interesting and well written. In some ways the most interesting part was the political side of the book, especially how the investigations were helped and hurt by waves of public opinion and the corresponding reaction of the political class.
Also, I read this AFTER reading The Leopard by Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa. I probably would have understood and appreciated The Leopard more if I switched that order.
Also, I read this AFTER reading The Leopard by Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa. I probably would have understood and appreciated The Leopard more if I switched that order.
May 11, 2023
Geweldig boek. Bevat het volledige verhaaln van Falcone en Borselino. Ik denk dat veel ouderen mensen dit door de jaren heen wel in het nieuws zullen hebben gevolgd, maar als iemand die uit 2001 komt, is dit een geweldig verhaal/recap. Ben pagina op pagina verbaasd door de werkethiek van Falcone, net als door de gruwelijkheid van de mafia.
June 5, 2017
The book was meticulous, although sometimes at the cost of the narrative. It was sad, but the story was ultimately about the courage and resiliency of two amazing Sicilians who gave their lives to make it a better place.
January 6, 2021
I really enjoyed learning about Falcone and Boresellino. I struggle with any media that romanticizes the mafia in any way and this book was great because it portrayed the mafia as criminals. The writing was exciting and engaging as well.
October 17, 2023
One of the most well-researched books I’ve ever read. My only knock is I wish Stille would have trickled in a few more first-hand stories from Mafiosos to break up some of the dryer parts of the book.
March 26, 2025
Very thorough. I watched the documentary version after reading the book. Adding a visual element really helped me to understand the main players and the immense pain that goes hand-in-hand with corruption.
May 18, 2025
I really appreciate how such a thorough and detailed non-fiction account remained engaging and story-driven. Definitely helps that the subject matter is as rich and complex as the Mafia, but Stille did a really excellent job.
September 17, 2017
Fascinating look into the lives of Falcone and Borsellino and deconstruction of the grip that Cosa Nostra has on Sicilian society.
August 14, 2022
Interesting story drowned under pages and more pages of describing internal rivalries in the Italian judicial system
February 19, 2023
Excelente libro, indispensable
Read
January 1, 2024Excellent description of the ant mafia campaign in the 1980s.im Palermo though a little turgid in its delivery.
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