Italian Police Arrest 181 in ‘Important Blow’ to Cosa Nostra

Italian police officers on Tuesday arrested 181 people believed to be affiliated with the Cosa Nostra, as the Sicilian mafia is known, dealing what officials said was an “important blow” to a criminal organization that has held the region in its grip for generations.

“Cosa Nostra is far from dead,” even after years of being targeted by prosecutors and police raids, Domenico La Padula, a lieutenant colonel with the Carabinieri police who oversaw the investigation, said in a telephone interview. The investigation, he said, showed that the group had reorganized and “had found new energy and new strength,” by enlisting new recruits and setting aside differences to instead focus on profiting from new criminal ventures, like online gambling.

The organization had been able to survive because it remained “strongly tied to the rules of its founding fathers and its ancient rituals,” even as it modernized, the Carabinieri said in a statement — for example, by using encrypted smartphones that “limited the need for traditional meetings and gatherings to the bare minimum.”

Tuesday’s arrests were carried out in Palermo, the Sicilian capital, and neighboring towns, and involved about 1,200 Carabinieri officers. Video released by the police showed hundreds of officers waiting for orders to enter homes as helicopters patrolled the skies during overnight raids. The arrests, which came after two years of investigations, covered a range of charges, including mafia affiliation, drug trafficking, extortion and attempted murder.