Giovanni Brusca kidnapped and held as hostage, the thirteen year old Giuseppe di Matteo for two years and then strangled and dissolved him in the acid, because his father Santino Di Matteo become a pentito and didn't want to retract his his repentance.
Technically, Brusca didn't do the kidnapping, but had men do it. One of those men was my husband's cousin, Gerlandino Messina. He told the boy they were taking him to see his father, which obviously was a lie. He also said when Giuseppe realized he'd been kidnapped, they could hear him screaming for his father from the back of the van and then duct taped his mouth shut at that time.
Also, whether or not Santino retracted his testimony, Brusca was never releasing that boy.
As for the woman in the article above who was shot and killed along with her boyfriend and 3-year old...she already buried a husband due to the mafia and here she was again hanging out with another mafioso; traveling with him and her son in the car, no less. You'd think she would have learned her lesson.
