The Mafia is invading Europe

An Oxford researcher has found the Mafia active in 110 European cities outside Italy.

A year ago, in March 2013, the University of Utrecht held a one-day workshop to discuss how Mafia groups operate across territories, kindly inviting me to the Netherlands as keynote speaker.

Mafiosi, I argued at the meeting, moved to Holland for two main reasons: to escape justice and to trade in drugs. What I did not know then was that a prominent ‘Ndrangheta member was also in Utrecht at that time. He belonged to the same criminal family that had unwittingly pushed this topic up the European agenda: the Strangio-Nirta clan.

Six months after the workshop, Francesco Nirta was finally arrested on the outskirts of Utrecht while eating fries in a shopping mall. Nirta had been in hiding since 2007. In his flat, the police found 40 kilos of cocaine and €18,000 in cash. Regrettably, his story supports my findings.

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