Would-be pentito grandson killed

(ANSA) - Cosenza, February 18 - Nicola Cocò Campolongo, 3, was murdered in January 2014 in the Calabrian town of Cassano allo Ionio because his grandfather Giuseppe Iannicelli, a convicted drug smuggler, intended to testify for the State in an investigation on Calabria's 'Ndrangheta mafia, according to a report published on Wednesday by the local newspaper Gazzetta del Sud.
    The toddler was murdered together with his grandfather and the man's Moroccan girlfriend Betty Taoussa.
    Iannicelli had reportedly written a letter to his wife, in which he expressed the intention of cooperating with prosecutors investigating a local 'Ndrangheta gang operating in Cassano Ionio.
    The gang, the only ethnic Roma 'Ndrangheta clan, manages a major heroin and cocaine smuggling operation between South America and Calabria through the Netherlands, according to investigators.
    The newspaper reported that Iannicelli's brother Battista first spoke about the letter to state attorneys whose investigation has just led to the arrest of 33 people.
    The letter has however never been found, according to the Gazzetta del Sud.