Libero Grassi

Libero Grassi (Catania, July 19, 1924 - Palermo, August 29, 1991) was a businessman from Palermo, Sicily, who was killed by the Mafia after taking a solitary stand against their demands for extortion, known as "pizzo" in Sicilian.

He ran a small men's underwear and pyjama business in Palermo and was married with a son and daughter. Like many shopkeepers in the city, he was soon subjected to demands to pay "pizzo" or face the consequences. [http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4158/is_20001218/ai_n14363680 'They say the Mafia is beaten. That's rubbish'] , The Independent, December 18, 2000]

A form of protection racket, the "pizzo" demands are made by the Mafia to local businesses and the refusal to pay up can mean vandalism or arson attacks on the place of business or even physical harm - up to murder - if demands are not met. The reputation of the Mafia is often enough to make people pay up immediately.

In late 1990, Grassi began to refuse to pay up, as an estimated 50% of Palermo businesses did. Furthermore he went very public about his refusal, co-operating with the police and eventually giving interviews to newspapers and even appearing on a television chatshow, yet refusing police protection. Eight Mafiosi were arrested and charged with extortion on the basis of evidence he gave to police.

In his interviews, he not only denounced the Mafia but also the way many of his fellow businessmen seemed to shun him, and how even customers began to cease to frequent his store in fear of being caught in the wrath of the Mafia who Grassi was provoking with his stance against them. Grassi stated in an interview:

"My colleagues have begun to attack me, saying that one should not wash dirty clothes in public. But in the meantime they continue to put up with it; because I know that they all pay. In my opinion, being intimidated and being collusive is the same thing."

Grassi eventually had his shop broken into in early 1991 and the exact amount of money that had been demanded of him was stolen. An unsuccessful arson attack on his shop soon followed.

On August 29, 1991, less than a year after taking his stance against the Mafia, 67-year-old Grassi was gunned down in the streets of Palermo.

Libero Grassi's wife, Pina Grassi, and her children, Davide and Alice, tried to salvage the family firm. "I was terrified for their safety so as the threats continued after Libero's killing, we reluctantly agreed to allow a state holding to run the company with Davide keeping a share," Pina recalls. Safe it may have been but incompetent public sector management sent it bankrupt.

Although it took sometime, his killer, the mafioso Salvatore "Salvino" Madonia and his father Francesco Madonia, the unquestioned patriarch of the Resuttana Mafia family in Palermo, were eventually brought to justice. A large trial in October 2006 saw thirty mobsters convicted of sixty murders dating back a quarter-of-a-century, with the Madonia's convicted of Grassi's slaying. [Stille, "Excellent Cadavers", p. 346] [it [http://espresso.repubblica.it/dettaglio-local/Morto-Madonia-boss-di-Resuttana/1538607/6 Morto Madonia, boss di Resuttana] , La Repubblica, March 14, 2007]

It was also in 2006, not long after Mafia boss Bernardo Provenzano was arrested, that a hundred shopkeepers in Palermo publicly declared their refusal to pay extortion to the Mafia, with Grassi's widow Pina Maisano, and son and daughter Davide and Alice, in attendance at public rallies denouncing the Mafia, jointly with the Addiopizzo movement. [ [http://www.corriere.it/english/articoli/2006/05_Maggio/03/pizzo.shtml One Hundred Defiant Shopkeepers Say "We Don’t Pay Protection Money"] , Corriere della Sera, May 5, 2006]

External links

* [http://www.bestofsicily.com/mag/art105.htm "Remembering Libero Grassi" at Best of Sicily]

References

*Jamieson, Alison (2000). "The Antimafia: Italy’s fight against organized crime", London: Macmillan Press ISBN 0-333-80158-X.
*Stille, Alexander (1995). "Excellent Cadavers. The Mafia and the Death of the First Italian Republic", New York: Vintage ISBN 0-09-959491-9