Notorious Camorra mafia boss once considered one of Europe’s richest and cruellest criminals and one of the inspirations for Gomorrah TV show turns supergrass 26 years after he was jailed in landmark trial

One of Italy’s most notorious mafia bosses, Francesco ‘Sandokan’ Schiavone, has become a state witness after 26 years behind bars.

Schiavone, who headed a Camorra mafia clan in Casal di Principe near Naples, operating from the southern city of Caserta, was once considered one of Europe’s richest and cruelest criminals.

He was arrested in a secret apartment in his hometown, hidden by a sliding granite block, while evading authorities in 1998, five years after he managed to escape the clutches of the law and evade surveillance and detection.

Schiavone has served several life sentences, including for multiple murders, after being convicted in the historic “Spartacus” mega-trial of 36 fellow clan members. He was also convicted on charges of arms trafficking, bombings and armed robbery.

The extensive trial saw dozens of people jailed, including sixteen leaders, as well as two female NATO officers who had affairs with Schiavone, and provided him with tools and weapons.

After the trial, which took Italian prosecutors five years to set up and covered mafia activity from 1988 to 1996, he was convicted in 2005, while his last appeal was rejected in 2010.

Schiavone was once considered one of Europe’s richest and cruelest criminals

Schiavone’s life was the inspiration behind the hit mafia TV show Gomorrah

Chiara Colosimo, head of parliament’s anti-mafia committee, called his decision to cooperate with authorities “another hard blow against the Camorra and organized crime.”

Schiavone and his crew were involved in brutal dispute settlement between clans fighting for control of Casal di Principe in the 1980s and 1990s, as well as selling illegal drugs, which became hugely profitable for him.

Schiavone was also involved in companies throughout Italy and the world.

His clan controlled shipping ports in Italy, clothing stores in Germany, Spain, Ireland, the Netherlands, Finland and Serbia, where they sold countless counterfeit branded clothing items at full price.

Their sloppy clothes would even find their way into the malls of New York and Chicago.

At one point, Schiavone’s family was estimated to be worth $47 billion.

Their brutality and economic and political power were exposed in Robert Saviano’s best-selling book, “Gomorrah,” which was later made into a film and put on TV. Saviano had to go into hiding and is still under police protection.

In an Instagram post on Friday, Saviano said he would wait and see what kind of information the gangster would provide before applauding his decision to turn.

“Will he be able to do that without revealing where the Camorra money is and without showing real political and business connections?” Saviano wrote.

Several relatives of the gangster have already cooperated.

His cousin, Carmine Schiavone, turned state witness in 1993 and notably revealed how the mafia dumped toxic waste in fields, springs and lakes – activities that were responsible for a spike in cancer cases among the local population.

His son Nicola (photo) was arrested in 2010 and became an informant in 2018

Walter (photo), the son of the mafia boss, became an informant in 2021

At one point, Schiavone’s family was estimated to be worth $47 billion

Two of his sons, Nicola, thought to have succeeded him before his arrest in 2010, and Walter, became ‘pentito’ in 2018 and 2021 respectively.

Schiavone had recently been transferred from prison in northern Italy to a prison in L’Aquila, where Sicilian mafia boss Matteo Messina Denaro was being cared for before his death last year.

Schiavone was said to be ill, but some media reports suggested on Friday that the rumors were a ruse to disguise a transfer that was actually the result of his cooperation.

Schiavone was dubbed ‘Sandokan’ because of his apparent resemblance to the actor who played the pirate hero of that name in a popular 1970s TV series.

After serving a three-year sentence in 1993, he managed to disappear before judges could place him under supervision.

He was on the run for five years and was finally arrested in his hometown near Naples.

He lived in a secret apartment in his family villa near Naples, accessible only through a sliding granite wall.

The mafia big man was so brazen that he managed to father two children with his wife while on the run, despite police closely monitoring her every move.

But after he was caught, his power and influence plummeted.

He was once forced to write to the Italian president begging for mercy during the Spartacus trial, and at one point tried to claim insanity by saying he would see ghosts and spirits in his cell in the run-up to the trial .

Experts told MailOnline earlier this year that the mafia’s influence was declining year on year, with Laura Garavini, a former Italian senator who spent several years of her career on the government’s anti-mafia commission, telling MailOnline ‘ it is possible’ to have a mafia-free Italy within the next thirty years.