Messina Denaro, the brother of Giuseppe di Matteo speaks, dissolved in acid at the age of 12: “I wish him long suffering”

When they learned of the arrest of the fugitive Matteo Messina Denaro, they felt “joy mixed with tears”. The baby’s mother and brother Giuseppe Di Matteo, the 12-year-old strangled and dissolved in acid almost two years after being kidnapped, precisely by order of the boss, today “the memory of that horrendous period” is being revived, as Nicola Di Matteo explained to AdnKronos. «I thank the police and the judiciary, who have always been close to us. The State has its times but always wins.

Giuseppe Di Matteo’s brother has no word of forgiveness for Messina Denaro: «It is something unthinkable in the face of the atrocities they have imposed on Giuseppe. You can’t forgive such a thing. Joseph was a little boy, forgiveness is unthinkable. Now he has to suffer like my brother». And again: «I read that he is ill. I hope that he can live as long as possible to have a long suffering, the same that he imposed on my brother, an innocent little boy ».

Nicola Di Matteo asks that now «also shed light on the covers» which allowed the mafia boss a 30-year long fugitive. “Let’s hope the whole truth comes out. These criminals never stray too far from their territories where they can count on a dense network of people ready to protect them”.

Giuseppe Di Matteo was the son of the repentant Santino: on November 14, 1993 he was leaving the stables where he had gone on horseback and was joined by a commando of mafiosi dressed as policemen who, telling him that they would take him to his father, convinced him to follow them.

The kidnapping, decided by Matteo Messina Denaro, Leoluca Bagarella, Giuseppe Graviano and Giovanni Brusca, was to serve as a warning to those belonging to the commando of the Massacre of Capaci who were collaborating with the judiciary. The 12-year-old was killed in San Giuseppe Jato on 11 January 1996. His body was never found, because it was dissolved in nitric acid.

The repentant Gaspare Spatuzza, asking forgiveness for that atrocious murder, reported in the courtroom: «At first the child screamed: “My dad, my love”. Then we tied him up like an animal and left him in the skip. He cried, we went back because what little humanity we still had came out. He called us saying that he had to go to the bathroom, but that wasn’t true. He was just afraid. So we went back to reassure him and told him we would see each other again the next day, but we never saw him again.’