Cosentino, 10 years sentence for external complicity in mafia association

Sentenced to 10 years in prison for external competition in mafia association for Nicola Cosentino, former undersecretary for the economy of the Berlusconi government and former regional coordinator of the Campania PDL. The sentence was pronounced by the judges of the fourth section of the Court of Appeal of Naples at the end of the Eco4 trial, named after the consortium that dealt with the collection and disposal of waste in various municipalities in the Caserta area. In the first instance Cosentino, assisted by the lawyers Stefano Montone and Agostino De Caro, was sentenced to 9 years in prison and perpetual interdiction from public offices for external competition in a Camorra association, with a sentence pronounced by the Court of Santa Maria Capua Vetere on 17 November 2016, after over 140 hearings. The request of the Naples Public Prosecutor’s Office, expressed during the hearing of last December 9, was 12 years of imprisonment. This is the heaviest accusation against Cosentino for years. An accusation that in the first instance cost him a sentence of 9 years in prison (the prosecutors had asked for 16) and a perpetual ban from public offices, and 10 years on appeal, as decided a little while ago by the judges. The story is related to the so-called “Eco4” process that describes Cosentino, of this the magistrates of the Naples general prosecutor’s office are convinced who had asked for 12 years in prison, as the national political referent of the Casalesi clan, with which the former Undersecretary would have made an iron pact to obtain electoral support in exchange for a contribution to the Camorra. Among the accusations, hence the name of the investigation, there are the alleged favors relating to the contract won in 1999 by the Orsi brothers, entrepreneurs believed to be close to the Bidognetti clan. 20 Municipalities of Caserta that dealt with the waste cycle. According to the prosecutors, it was Cosentino himself who allowed the Orsi brothers to join the consortium by creating the mixed company Eco4 which then obtained direct assignments. But if in the first instance Cosentino was recognized as the “national referent of the Casalesi clan” at least until 2004, the Dda of Naples filed an appeal claiming that the support of the former undersecretary to the Casalesi had continued at least until 2007- 2008. Hence the request for a higher penalty than that decided in the first instance. A trial, that in Cosentino, also based on the words of the collaborators of justice, and which sees it, according to the accusations, as the dominus of the Ce4, within which the former undersecretary would have hired many people in the pre-electoral periods , thus ‘controlling’ the results of various elections, especially in the municipalities falling within the consortium basin. All this, always according to the prosecutors, with the awareness that the Orsi brothers were close to the clans. Arguments, those of the public prosecution, belittled by the defense lawyers of Cosentino, Stefano Montone, Agostino De Caro and Elena Lepre, convinced that there are no signs of Cosentino’s contribution to the clan in 25 years of political activity. For the lawyers, there is not a single sign of an effective electoral contribution that the Camorra would have given to Cosentino, also because in the past, when the clan sided in favor of a candidate in the political elections, the results were completely evident. And this accusation, votes in exchange for favors, the lawyers explained, is one of the legs of the synallagmatic agreement that the prosecutor supports, but at the state – according to the defenders – there is no trace that Cosentino has received the votes of the Camorra , while as regards the favors, the lawyers recalled not only that in the meantime Cosentino was acquitted in the other trials where he was accused with the aggravating mafia, but also that in the dozens of other trials against the Casalesi clan on contracts, large works and so on, no role of Cosentino emerged. This is a circumstance which, for the lawyers, leads to the conclusion that the former undersecretary cannot be the national referent of the Casalesi. Therefore, according to the lawyers, at present there is only the data of Cosentino’s interest in the events of the Eco4 mixed company, but these are events in which Cosentino intervenes in his capacity as a politician. The Eco4 company, the lawyers argued, is the operational arm of the Ce4 consortium, and this, after the 1999 elections, moves as a reference from the center-left to the center-right, and it is therefore normal for Cosentino and Landolfi to take control, since it is of a political body. An organization that operates through the Eco4 that Cosentino, the lawyers explained, ‘inherits’, as the Bears build it independently and before Cosentino appears on the scene. As for the declarative sources, for the lawyers they were clearly disavowed. Lastly, apart from the ‘repentant’ Nicola Schiavone, son of the Casalesi chieftain Francesco “Sandokan” Schiavone, who contradicted himself in the courtroom, other collaborators of justice, the defenders of Cosentino argue, were also denied. The last of whom, Luigi Guida, who accuses Cosentino de relato, in a different sentence was considered unreliable and mendacious when he talks about a meeting in which he physically participated and which, in reality, never took place. IN COSENTINO There are more than one trials, convictions and acquittals for Nicola Cosentino. The last sentence in order of time before that of today for external competition, is dated 29 September 2020 and is related to the trial “The prince and the ballerina card”, which ended with the acquittal. But even before that, the former Campania coordinator of Forza Italia had been acquitted (definitively) also in the so-called “Carburanti” trial. Cosentino also suffered a final sentence for bribing a prison police officer while he was detained and another, for defamation, as part of the “P3” investigation. Specifically, the former undersecretary was acquitted in the appeal process “The prince and the ballerina card” from the charge of attempting to reuse illegal capital, with the aggravating mafia, in relation to the construction of a shopping center (never built) wanted by the Casalesi clan in Casal di Principe (in the first instance Cosentino was sentenced to 5 years by the Court of Santa Maria Capua Vetere). In the reasons for the acquittal, the judges highlighted that Cosentino had no interest in building the shopping center, while the reconstructions of the collaborators of justice (including Nicola Schiavone, son of the Casalesi chieftain Francesco “Sandokan” Schiavone) were judged generic, not found and in many cases denied in the trial. Then, in June 2019, Cosentino was acquitted by the Supreme Court (which rejected the appeal of the general prosecutor) as part of the “Fuel” trial. In this case, the former undersecretary was at the stand together with the brothers Giovanni and Antonio and other defendants, accused in various ways of extortion and illicit competition aggravated by mafia methods. The facts referred to the Cosentino family business, Aversana Petroli. In October 2018, the Naples Court of Appeal had already acquitted him, while in the first instance Cosentino was sentenced to 7 years and six months in prison. On the other hand, the sentence of 4 years of imprisonment for having bribed a prison police officer in the Secondigliano prison in order to bring food, clothes and an ipod into the cell. Finally, as part of the investigation into the alleged “P3”, Cosentino was sentenced to 10 months not for crimes connected with the criminal association but for defamation and private violence against the former president of the Campania Region Stefano Caldoro.