Pasquale Manfredi, accused of being one of the top figures in the 'Ndrangheta mafia, was found in Calabria.

Italian police have used social networking site Facebook to track down and capture one of the country's most-wanted fugitive mafia suspects.Pasquale Manfredi, accused of being one of the top figures in the 'Ndrangheta mafia, was found in Calabria.
The 33-year-old, who faces charges of murder, mafia association and drugs trafficking, was traced via his network of Facebook contacts. Reports suggest he called himself Scarface, after the film character. According to Italian newspaper La Repubblica, he was arrested as he tried to escape from the roof of the apartment complex near the southern city of Crotone. Believed to lead the 'Ndrangheta in the southern town, Pasquale Manfredi is also accused of possessing illegal armaments, including heavy weapons. Police say the man - one of the country's 100 most-wanted suspects - was responsible for the 2004 murder of a member of a rival clan, who was killed with a portable rocket launcher.

Police may be closing in on Italy's most wanted mafia boss, Messina Denaro

Police may be closing in on Italy's most wanted mafia boss, Messina Denaro. Denaro's brother, Salvatore Denaro was arrested on Monday in an operation involving 200 officers.He was detained along with 18 others who authorities say are members of a network surrounding the "boss of bosses" of the Cosa Nostra, who has been on the run since 1993. The prisoners face charges of organizing godfather Messina Denaro's secret correspondence to help him escape arrest. Head of Police in Trapani, Giuseppe Linares says the accused had a complex system in place to avoid police infiltration. "The group (in charge to help him) had reduced contacts among themselves to a minimum, just to maybe one or two occasions every year. They communicated only by means of pieces of paper ('pizzini') and they only used very trusted people, mostly from within the family." Like previous fugitive godfathers, Messina Denaro reportedly controls the mob by sending secret "pizzini", messages typed on tiny pieces of onionskin paper and hidden between the messenger's toes — these are used to communicate between Mafia lieutenants. Messina Denaro has a playboy image. Nicknamed "Diabolik" after a comic-book character, the mobster was sentenced to life in absentia for his part in a 1993 Mafia bombing campaign which left 10 people dead and more than 90 injured.

Extradited gangster Abu Salem was today produced before a Delhi court in an eight-year-old case of alleged extortion.

Metropolitan magistrate Sandeep Garg issued notices to two witnesses to appear on April five and directed that Salem be kept at Tihar jail here as he is to be produced tomorrow in another court.Salem was brought here by the Mumbai police sleuths following a production warrant issued by the court which is recording statement of witnesses in the case.Salem, who was extradited from Portugal in 2005, is being tried along with others for allegedly making extortion calls to a city businessman in 2002.
The statement of Rajat Nagrath, who had filed a complaint against Salem and others in 2002 with the Delhi Police's Special Cell alleging the gangster was demanding Rs5 crore as protection money, was recorded in-camera on December 15 following his request.Salem is to be produced tomorrow before another court which is to hear arguments on framing of charges against him under stringent MCOCA in another case of alleged extortion.He is also likely to be produced before another court at Patiala House here in a third case of alleged extortion.