Eleven members of a Rome-based mafia clan known for its ostentatious funerals and garishly decorated villas are facing trial for allegedly stealing electricity by an illegal connection to their neighbours’ supply.
The charges emerged as part of an investigation into the Casamonica clan, whose illegally built villas in the Quadraro district were demolished in 2018 as the former Rome mayor Virginia Raggi tried to tackle organised crime in the city.
The 11 suspects are accused of “aggravated theft of electricity” after evading bills totalling €60,000 (£51,000), La Repubblica reported.
Rome prosecutors allege that clan members living in several of the villas hacked into the meter of the company providing electricity to their neighbours, installing a cable to hook the supply to their homes.
The sprawling Casamonica clan has been associated with racketeering, extortion and usury for decades, mostly operating under the radar until 2015, when a lavish funeral for crime boss, Vittorio Casamonica, drew public outrage.
The ceremony was replete with a gilded horse-drawn carriage, flower petals tossed from a helicopter and the theme tune from The Godfather playing outside a church in the outskirts of Rome. The outrage was further fuelled after the dead boss’s daughter and nephew were hosted on an Italian TV chatshow.
Two years after Raggi was elected in 2016, police confiscated eight Casamonica villas, filled with marble statues of tigers and horses and other items of regal furniture, that were then bulldozed.
The crime group continued to operate, with three women closely associated with it arrested for drug dealing on Sunday. In February, authorities seized possessions worth €22m from the clan, including more luxury villas, cars and jewellery.
A report last year found that the Casamonica family had grown from being nomads to the most feared “godfathers” in Rome. The clan infiltrated several neighbourhoods in the outskirts of the city before spreading its wings to other areas of the Lazio region.
The report found that the Casamonica clan includes as many female members as it does male.
