Forget the Cosa Nostra, the Chinese Triads and the Mexican Cartels. The ’Ndrangheta is regarded by many as the most powerful organised crime syndicate on the planet. It has more money and a more extensive reach over the legal economy. It maintains a particularly effective grip on certain illicit markets, primarily the cocaine trade. Research and policing efforts on the ’Ndrangheta have looked at its expansion to Germany, Australia, Canada, various European markets, and even some American industries.
What is the ’Ndrangheta you say? It’s the name of the ‘Honoured Society’, a mafia-type organisation whose shadowy origins lie in the southern Italian region of Calabria. You should visit Calabria for some of its seaside towns, its beautiful inlets and caves behind and above the deep blue Mediterranean Sea. They are just gorgeous. But the ’Ndrangheta – try and pronounce it – ’N-d-r-à-n-g-h-e-t-a – is said to be everywhere. Some say that it is a global threat, others that it is more like a powerful, free-flowing river that cannot be stopped (yes, someone did say that). Some experts believe that it is the most powerful criminal organisation of all time.
Now in order to make a mafia, you need certain ingredients. You need rituals and formulas for recruitment and affiliation, you need reputation-supporting violence that binds a group together. You need the capacity to intimidate and subjugate people around you. Most of all, you need the ability to invest in foreign and local commerce, licit or illicit, and to seek influence within local or national politics that benefits your power-hungry and profit-seeking structure. The ’Ndrangheta, aside from having all of this, has a particular link with the culture and the territory of Calabria, where it originates and still operates.
Has anyone heard of these rituals and affiliations on these shores? Of Calabrian-born offenders corrupting economic and political structures in this country? Not really. None of the UK agencies have ever mentioned the ’Ndrangheta – or the mafia – as a national problem. There is no data suggesting this criminal organisation is anywhere near us, and the relevant authorities can barely pronounce their name. And yet, Italian authorities swear that not only has the ’Ndrangheta spread across Europe, but that the UK is yet another outpost in its burgeoning empire.
Logically, it’s either one or the other: either the ’Ndrangheta has expanded its reach to the UK; or the UK is secure from ‘Ndrangheta influence. If the former, then where are the recorded instances of their activity? And if the latter, where is this cognitive discrepancy coming from?
On March 31 of this year, at the High Court, Mr Justice Fordham made a defunct law firm, Giambrone & Law, pay €3.5 million to 41 separate investors. The case didn’t make the headlines, but this was only the latest ruling in almost 13 years of litigation in the British court system about alleged ‘Ndrangheta activity.
The defendants, Giambrone & Law, were practicing in London and Italy at the time of the events. Two Italian companies also feature in the story: RDV SRL (‘RDV’) and Veco Construzioni Srl (‘Veco’). The administrator (i.e. director) of RDV was one Mr Cuppari, and the administrator of Veco was Mr Velardo.
In 2006, Veco and RDV were planning to construct luxury apartments on two adjoining sites at Brancaleone in Calabria. The two developments together were known as ‘Jewel of the Sea’.
