Mafia Trial
Andreotti was investigated for his role in the 1979 murder of Mino Pecorelli, a journalist who had published allegations that Andreotti had links with the Mafia and with the kidnapping of Aldo Moro. A court acquitted him in 1999 after a trial that lasted three years, but he was convicted on appeal in November 2002 and sentenced to twenty-four years' imprisonment. The eighty-three-year-old Andreotti was immediately released pending an appeal. On October 30, 2003 an appeal court overturned the conviction and acquitted Andreotti of the original murder charge. That same year, the court of Palermo acquitted him of ties to the Mafia, but only on grounds of expiry of statutory terms. The court established that Andreotti had indeed had strong ties to the Mafia until 1980, and had used them to further his political career to such an extent as to be considered part of the Mafia itself.
Andreotti defended himself by saying he took harsh measures against the Mafia while in government. Andreotti's seventh government (1991–92) did take a number of decisive steps against the Mafia, thanks to the presence of anti-Mafia judge Giovanni Falcone at the Ministry of Justice. "When he says that he took extremely harsh measures against the Mafia, he isn't lying", wrote Eugenio Scalfari, editor of the newspaper La Repubblica. "I think at a certain point in the late Eighties he realised that the Mafia could not be controlled. He awoke from his perennial distraction ... and the Mafia, which realised that it could no longer count on his protection or tolerance, assassinated his man in Sicily." His man in Palermo was Salvo Lima, who was murdered by the Mafia in March 1992. The murder of Lima was a turning point in relations between the Mafia and its political associates. The Mafia felt betrayed by Lima and Andreotti. In their opinion they had failed to block the January 1992 confirmation by the Court of Cassation (court of final appeal) of the sentence in the Maxi Trial of 1986, which had sent scores of Mafiosi to jail.
Read more about this topic: Giulio Andreotti
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“In government offices which are sensitive to the vehemence and passion of mass sentiment public men have no sure tenure. They are in effect perpetual office seekers, always on trial for their political lives, always required to court their restless constituents.”
—Walter Lippmann (1889–1974)