Potenza. The trial for an arson attack on a journalist’s home begins after four years

OSSIGENO March 19, 2022 – Marianna Zampoli, Judge of the Preliminary Hearing of the Court of Potenza, at the beginning of March 2022 indicted 15 persons  identified following a 2019 investigation by the District Anti-Mafia Directorate against the Schettino mafia clan, operating in the province of Matera in Basilicata ( read here). Among them were the “boss” Gerardo Schettino, a former policeman and his son, Giuseppe. The latter was accused – together with four other people – of having tried in 2018 to set fire to the house of the doctor/journalist Filippo Mele, correspondent of “La Gazzetta del Mezzogiorno” from Scanzano Jonico (Matera), irked by his articles on the criminal activities of the clan in the Ionian coastal area of ​​Lucania (see Ossigeno).

Among the various alleged crimes, there was the attack on the doctor/journalist who on the 10^th October 2018 in front of the gate of his country house found an anonymous envelope containing a blank sheet of paper, an unexploded pistol bullet and a red ballpoint pen. The police discovered a hole in the roof of the house and subsequent tests established that it was caused by the explosion of an unsophisticated incendiary device. According to the investigators, the Schettinis were the instigators of the attack.

LT