Cellino ex-mayor, executive councillors arrested - update 2
Town council dissolved in April 2014 for mafia infiltration

(ANSA) - Cellino San Marco, April 10 - Police on Friday arrested 14 people relation to a corruption probe, including the former mayor of the Puglia town of Cellino San Marco, near Brindisi, and several ex-members of the council executive. The municipality was put in the hands of commissioners appointed by central government for mafia infiltration in April 2014. The former mayor, criminal lawyer and Forza Italia member Francesco Cascione, has been taken to jail.
Those arrested are suspected of crimes ranging from criminal association to embezzlement. Four entrepreneurs from the provinces of Brindisi, Bari and Lecce were also among the people arrested along with a person considered close to Puglia's Sacra Corona Unita mafia syndicate. Investigators suspected that a criminal organisation headed by Cascione manipulated public contracts and staff selection procedures, including one for municipal police officers, in exchange for bribes.