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Article: Mafia takes a hit after crackdown by Italian officials Mob's attacks in early '90s triggered prosecution of Cosa Nostra leaders
- Article from:
- The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel (Milwaukee, WI)
- Article date:
- April 26, 1998
- Author:
CopyrightCopyright 1998 The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Provided by ProQuest LLC. (Hide copyright information)
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The big news in Palermo this spring is not of mob wars in the
streets, bloody horse heads between the sheets or officials on the
take.
It's that the Sicilian Mafia's "men of honor" are on the run.
One sign of the Cosa Nostra's startling decline was this month's
opening of Verdi's "Aida" at the Teatro Massimo the first opera to
grace the stage of one of Europe's largest theaters in a
quarter-century.
The neoclassical theater was closed in 1974 for minor repairs,
but, like so many public works projects in Sicily, was milked for
years by the Mafia for millions of dollars in contracting scams, and
the work was never completed. Now the theater is open, the old
contractors are being ...