The finance guard on Tuesday
arrested four men and are seeking three more on suspicion of
forming an international drug trafficking ring that brought
cocaine from Colombia, Ecuador and Peru.
The seven arrested in the southern Puglia and Calabria
regions face charges of criminal association with intent to
acquire, import, transport, possess, distribute and sell drugs.
Police have detained Francesco and Vittorio Pezzuto, aged
71 and 48, from the town of Squinzano in Puglia, as well as
Giuseppe Novello, 34, and Stefano Condina, 59, from Calabria.
Squinzano-based brothers Antonio and Patrizio Pellegrino and
one Colombian national have escaped arrest and are being sought
by police.
The investigation kicked off in 2013 when the alleged
traffickers offered a finance guard who was posted to Brindisi
port 100,000 euros to look the other way while the drugs were
moved in.
He reported the attempted bribery instead.
The organization allegedly brought shipments of 70-100
kilos of cocaine - worth about four million euros each - into
Genoa and Gioia Tauro ports disguised in canned asparagus and
banana shipments.
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