Mondo di Mezzo case wasn't mafia rules top court

(ANSA) - Rome, October 23 - The supreme Court of Cassation on Tuesday reversed a lower court's verdict and ruled that the people convicted in the huge 'Mondo di Mezzo' (Middle World) corruption case in Rome were not guilty of mafia association. As a result the sentences of the two ringleaders of the gang, which got its hands city contracts worth millions, ranging from the running of Roma and migrant camps to waste management and maintaining green areas, will have to be re-calculated.
    At the appeals level, former gangster and ex-member of the NAR right-wing terrorist group Massimo Carminati was given a term of 14 years and six months.
    The term of leftwing cooperatives chief Salvatore Buzzi was 18 years, four months.
    The case was initially nicknamed 'Capital Mafia' after prosecutors said it regarded organized crime.
    In the first sentence, judges had aid there were two separate criminal organisations in the case and they were not mafia-like in nature.
    But the appeals verdict said had mafia association was involved, before the supreme court reversed that reversal.
    The ringleaders were caught on a wiretap saying they could make more on Roma and migrant camps than from drugs.
    Mondo di Mezzo refers to Carminati's nickname for the demi-monde he operated in.
    Some former members of the centre-left Democratic Party (PD) were also involved in the 'Mondo di Mezzo' case and in February former centre-right Rome Mayor Gianni Alemanno got six years for illegal financing corruption in a separate case linked to it.
    In Italy sentences do not usually become effective until the appeals process has been exhausted.