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Witness History: The businessman who defied the Mafia

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The businessman who defied the Italian Mafia

02/09/2021 GMT

The businessman who defied the Mafia

BBC World Service - Witness History, The businessman who defied the Mafia

How an anti-Mafia businessman paid the ultimate price for standing up to organised crime

Italian businessman Libero Grassi was killed in Sicily in 1991, for publicly refusing to pay protection money to the Mafia.

Palermo businessman Libero Grassi published an open letter in Sicily’s main newspaper denouncing the Mafia for constantly demanding extortion payments. Grassi was hailed as a hero, but his public refusal to pay was intolerable to the Mafia and a few months later, in the summer of 1991, he was executed in person by one of Cosa Nostra’s top bosses. Libero Grassi’s defiance is credited with inspiring a new grass-roots movement among businesses in Sicily that stands up to the Mafia. Simon Watts spoke to his daughter, Alice Grassi.

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