Why is there no mafia in Sardinia?

Why is there no mafia in Sardinia?

Why there is no organized crime group in Sardinia?
A groupe like the mafia, cosa nostra or ndrangetha?

An orgnaized crime group that started on the island.

Because the Sardinia was always very poor so from 1960s to 1997 born the Anonima sarda a gruop of various gangs focused on the kidnappings for ransom (about 150 kidnappings have been counted between 1960 and 1997).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anonima_sarda

Thanks for the info.

Bit they never tried to organized some
Kind of group like the rest of italy?

The Anonima sarda could become more than kidnappers.
For example, in montreal, the west end gang started as robbers, but became more diverse later.

southern regions were poor too, i think in sardinia there was not the conditions to develope it in fact the government consider local crime ordinary gangs and not mafia-style group, never heard of a sardinian criminal under 41-bis regime

It's kind of the same situation with Corsica.

The Corsican criminal groups have been the main French OC for several decades (the so called "French connection" was actually the "Corsican Connection") and they are by far the most clanic and organized group of all the French groups but they don't have the rules and codes of the Mafia (induction ceremony, official hierarchy, families,...). They still are very powerful.though and it's probably the same with Sardinian groups.

Corsican groups can actually be considered to be a certain force in OC though.
Can't say the same for whatever small pockets of Sardinian criminals there may be, who are definitely not noteworthy enough to be considered a force in OC.

Thats why I was wondering about the island of Sardinia.
Sicily well we already know about there OC.
Corisca are well established in France.

But Sardinia..... nothing
And how come ?

there is not a specific reason, it just happened, we could say the same of malta (another small island)... there are small criminal groups but there are not mafia-style groups which are characteristic only of southern Italy in europe anyway and even over there it differs from an area to another

I believe Burlesconi had a place in Sardinia, I think he hosted then UK PM Tony Blair and his wife. Burlesconi is an interesting character on his own, with implied P2/Mafiosi contacts.

The Island of Malta may be a tax haven?, not sure, Monaco, was used as one in the past. Also, the Knights of Malta is a wing of the Jesuits of Catholic Church, which Joe Bonanno was inducted.

I think there is a pic of Bonanno inducting in the thread about Saputo.

Malta doesn't have a big local organized crime syndicate either, but there are plenty of Maltese criminal elements (crooked businessmen and such).

Quite a number of Maltese immigrated to Australia and they tend to join outlaw motorcycle groups. Rebels MC (former) president Alex Vella was born on the island and the Rebels MC in general have a noticeable Maltese presence.

Malta is literally controlled by Sicilians, also 'Ndrangheta has a lot of casinos there and use it for laundering money

criminal elements are everywhere included sardinia, i think a sardinian is in the most wanted national list next messina denaro but there is not a local mafia-style group, not even a small one

Yep. Lots of Sicilian mafia money got laundered through local banks.
Maltese instances are willfully turning a blind eye to the local operations of Italian crime syndicates. And there's plenty of crooked local entrepreneurs that are ready to be of assistance.

theres even places the mafia won't go??

Here is a lot of false statements.

Proceed in order.

Whats the different between Sicily and Sardinia ?

In 1861 Sicily was finaly affiliated with Italy. From the end of rome they where under foreign ownership.
After 1861, the state was completely in northern hands. The mafia was the cradle of foreign rule and feudalism.

What was the situation in Sardinia?
Sardinia was affiliated with Spain-Habsburg. Catalan and Sardinian language are connected with each other.
After 1794 sardinia was part for the Kingdome of Sardinia and Piemont. They were never in such extreme way isolated like siciliy.

Organized Crime in Sardinia

In 60's 70's and less in 80's some villages were famous for kidnapping and other stuff.
Sometimes they was called Anonima sequestri. This phenomenon was directly linked to the poverty of the Sardinians.
In Germany sometimes they call guys for jobs for example to burn a house down.This guys were more freelancer i think.

Current situation.

Of course they exist a local organzed crime

For example Old thugs like Graziano Mesina https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/italy/10113587/Sardinian-bandit-hero-returns-to-his-criminal-ways.html

Or new

I'm sure other groups are also in Sardinia. But you have to get local guys are share. The Upperworld ist much more import in Sardinia.

To Malta, the whole island is a single mafia. Cosa nostra can do business. But they don't control the Maltese.
Historical, maltese criminals are strong involved in different racketeering in London. But there are still supposed to be boys from them today

The island is large but underpopulated with not even 2 million inhabitants, and inland people were engaged in sheep farming while those who live along the coast work with tourism.

Too poverty for create a native organizated oc gruop.

I know a few Sardinians involved in drug trafficking. The Sardinian diaspora in Belgium, France and Germany is pretty big.

and calabria?? it was underpopulated and even poorer... i bet the main reason is that sardinia was not part of the kingdom of the two sicilies, the mafia groups were born thanks to favorable historical environment and links with politicians and masonry since the beginning

Sardinia is mostly mountainous and until the 1960s with the explosion of tourism, most of the islanders work was the sheep farming while Calabria still had large cities and some industries,today there are few people that lives in Sardinia that in Calabria.
Tre only difference was that the calabrians used the ransoms for entry in the drug trafficking while the sardinians continue with the kidnapping without invest the money because were various gangs without a verticale structure.

yes but ndrangheta started in the late 1800s it has nothing to do with drug trafficking, that's a business that emerged far later... i mean the reasons why mafia-style groups did not develop in sardinia are historical, no feudal system, different politics etc.

Maltese crime in London is dead and buried. Historically they were mostly involved in running brothels in Soho. Up until the 1960's - 1970's that was a thing. There were still Maltese operating in brothels in the 1980's, but the last remnants were wiped out when the Canning Town group took over by force. This was actually in the news in the late 90's;

https://www.theguardian.com/uk/1999/nov/28/tonythompson.theobserver

As for the existence of a "Maltese mafia" on the island itself. I've no doubt it exist in some form, but it's not a major force on a European scale.

Good answers from all of you.

Still kind of crazy when you think about it. Sicily is really special in the history of organized crime. The power that people from this island has in the criminal world.

You would think, that the other islands would have some kind of power also in the criminal world. Corisca had some kind of power because of the french connection. I guess corscan groups use to control the criminal word in Marseille.

Didnt know about the criminal groups of Malta in London.

@The KillingJoke

Sorry, but a European scale is a stupid concept.
OC group can't be ranking or scaling.
For exmaple Malta play a important role for oil smuggling. Nobody can't hidden a massiv Oil distribution network.
The maltese wealth families give some guy in this biz protection. In Greece you have the same thing.
It is unimportant how powerful you are anywhere in the world. You have to be powerful in Malta. And in Malta it's mostly Maltese
When Russians get new passports in Malta for 10,000, that's convenient for them. But the Maltese make it possible.
Division of labor also exists with criminals.

They killed a young journalist. Not the Cosa nostra, no they link was directly to the goverment to the rich families.
Same for other country's. Cosa nostra are powerful. But its complete different between his home and cells in other countries.

Scaling make no sense. In Cosa Nostra different families have very different influences. They don't always share it.

But this is offtopic.

I think Sardinia bandits never get this kind of protection. Never forgett after the II WW cosa nostra was finish. But they get "green light" to rebuild because they need them to fight against left groups.
Sardinia never had a secret society like CN. But of course they have criminals groups. In old days they also had vendettas.

Good point.

The Corsican mob also benefited greatly from the end of WW2. They played a key role in the French Resistance networks and were rewarded when the war was over. They were given control of the gambling clubs in Paris (called "Cercles de jeux") which are, to this day, the only gambling places allowed in the Paris area. The Corsicans were already running Marseille underworld, turning it into the drug capital of the world for some time, and the decision to have them run the Paris gambling clubs allow them to get a piece of the Paris underworld, making them the biggest CO in France. Finally, Corsicans are also heavily involved in gambling in French speaking Africa and that also goes back to the post WW2 era.

So I guess, as you said, one of the reasons why Sardinians didn't follow the path of their Sicilian and Corsican cousins is also because they were not given the same opportunities at the end of WW2.

after the II WW cosa nostra was weakened but not defeated... the fact that fascism defeated it was just a propaganda

I think I read somewhere Corsicans and Sardinians are actually very close in terms of genetic ancestry as well as language.

I also feel for the Sicilians and the Corsicans it was a bit of a "right time, right place" situation. Sicily was close to a major country (and market) like Italy, while Corsica was claimed by France which allowed criminals to move to the south of the country and seeing Marseille was a major port city it was ripe for exploitation. Sardinian criminal never really had these opportunities so something like a major "underworld" never really came into fruition.

And once an actual underworld has been allowed to grow and manifest itself in a society, it's nearly impossible to eradicate it. The Sicilian mafia is still going strong and the Corsicans as well are still in business. They largely moved away from narcotics - in France that seems to be an Algerian thing these days - but they still make a lot of money with casino and gambling rackets. And outsiders encroaching on that turf, are still put out of business with the quickness.

I’m pretty sure that Napoleon Bonaparte was Corsican, he was Emperor of France. I have heard something about lineage, as well, as friendliness between Sicilian/Southern Italians and Corsicans, because of this, etc.

French Connection, prime example.

Corsica is French for political and historical reasons but ethnically speaking, they are part of the Italian "race" (for lack of a better word).

The Corsican language is as much an Italian dialect as the Sicilian, Sardinian and Calabrian. I speak Italian as a foreign language and i can understand Corsican pretty easily.

Corsica has a similar clanic, omerta and honor culture as the mezzogiorno and the Italian islands. It is a big part of why they are so dominant in the French criminal world. Interestingly, the French authorities have only recently started to consider the Corsican COs as a proper mafia like organization which need to be dealt with trough the legal tools that are efficient against OC. The last year, France has established an official informant status with a kind of WITSEC program and, so far, the first and only person to have benefited from it is a member of the Corsican mafia. He is a bit like the French Joe Valachi as he was able to reveal all the power and structure of the main Corsican group called "La Brise de Mer".

Most famous bandit is Graziano Mesina he is a hero to many in the 1960 and 1970s for his supposedly anti-capitalist kidnappings, daring prison breaks and glamorous lifestyle on the run.
He was pardoned in 2004 after almost 50 years in and out of jails but returned to drug trafficking and attempted kidnapping in 2013, extortion and loan sharking. His drug network was linked to the Calabrian 'Ndrangheta..