Thirty years later, the truth about what happened in Via Mariano D'Amelio seems to be enveloped by the same huge black cloud of smoke and mystery that suddenly rose on the sky of Palermo on July 19, 1992, when at 4 pm: 58 a Fiat 126, stuffed with 90 kilograms of explosives, was blown up with a remote control. A roar and then silence, sirens and news in the newspapers. Fifty-seven days after Giovanni Falcone's death, judge Paolo Borsellino, who had gone to visit his mother, and the escort agents Agostino Catalano, Emanuela Loi , Vincenzo Li Muli, Walter Eddie Cosina and Claudio Traina were killed. There are so many questions, questions, processes and mysteries that have been chasing each other for years now. The answers? Few.
The latest news on Via D'Amelio comes from the court of Caltanissetta which decided to bring down the aggravating mafia, declaring the charges against the policemen Mario Bo and Fabrizio Mattei, accused of having misled the investigation into the massacre, prescribed. Michele Ribaudo was acquitted because "the fact does not constitute a crime". All three were part of the Palermo police mobile squad, led by Arnaldo La Barbera, and, according to the Caltanissetta prosecutor's office, they had induced and forced the false confessions of Vincenzo Scarantino, the false repentant of the Cosa Nostra.
“July 19, 1992 was a Sunday. Me, my wife Connie and our two children had rented a two-room apartment in San Martino delle Scale, a village on top of the hills overlooking Palermo, to escape the fiery temperatures of the Sicilian summer. At half past four in the afternoon we got out in the car to go home. When I pulled up the car in front of the door in via Giorgione, where we lived, we heard a dull roar spread over our heads - says Enzo Mignosi , journalist, writer, at the corresponding time of Corriere della Sera from Sicily - The car shook for a few moments . It was 16.58. I saw people decide to look out on the balconies. Hundreds of eyes on Monte Pellegrino. It didn't take long to realize it was an explosion and I told my wife: 'it's a bomb' ”.
“I gave her the keys to the house and headed towards the city center as the incessant wail of the sirens began. I was sure it had fallen to Paolo Borsellino. I decided to follow an ambulance as it sped towards the shipyard area. The car wedged into via Autonomia Siciliana, I was stopped by a security cordon. I continued on foot. In via D'Amelio I saw the scenes of hell - adds Mignosi - Dozens of cars reduced to fragments, others on fire, dismembered bodies, gruesome details. Crazy chaos. I felt indescribable horror. It was not clear how many victims were, but the name of Borsellino was already circulating. An immense crowd stood around the charred remains of a Chroma. It was the magistrate's car. I wanted to see better but they wouldn't let me get close. There was an air of war. In those conditions it was difficult to calm the emotional storm and take on the role of reporter to tell yet another great Sicilian tragedy. But this was my turn to do. It wasn't the first time and it wouldn't be the last ”.
Angelo Barraco