Organized Crime in Italy - Sicilian Mafia (Cosa Nostra) - Stidda or La Stidda

Stidda or La Stidda

La Stidda (Sicilian, star) is the name given to the Sicilian organization started by criminals Giuseppe Croce Benvento and Salvatore Calafato, both of Palmi di Montechiaro, Agrigento province. The Stidda's power bases are centered in the cities of Gela and Favara, Caltanissetta and Agrigento provinces. The organization's groups and activities have flourished in the cities of Agrigento, Catania, Siracusa and Enna in the provinces of the same name, Niscemi and Riesi of Caltanissetta province and Vittoria of Ragusa province, located mainly on the Southern and Eastern coasts of Sicily.

The Stidda has extended its power and influence into the mainland Italy provinces of Milano, Genova and Torino. The members of the organization are called stiddari in Caltanissetta province and stiddaroli in Agrigento province. Stidda members can be identified and sometimes introduced to each other by a tattoo of five greenish marks arranged in a circle, forming a star called "i punti della malavita" or "the points of the criminal life."

The Cosa Nostra wars of the late 1970s and early 1980s that brought the Corleonesi Clan and its vicious and ruthless leaders Luciano Leggio, Toto Riina and Bernardo Provenzano sometimes referred to as "Cosa Nuova" into power caused disorganization and disenchantment inside the traditional Cosa Nostra power base and values system, leaving the growing Stidda organization to counter Cosa Nostra's power, influence and expansion in Southern and Eastern Sicily. The Stidda membership was reinforced by Cosa Nostra men of honor such as those loyal to slain Capo Giuseppe DiCristina of Riesi who had defected from Cosa Nostra's ranks due to the bloodthirsty reign of the Corleonesi clan.

The organization also looked to enlarge its membership by absorbing local thugs and criminals (picciotti) who were at the margins of organized crime to gain more power and credibility in the Italian underworld. From 1978 to 1990, former Corleonesi clan leader and pretender to the Cosa Nostra's "Capo di Tutti Capi" title, Toto Riina, waged a war within Cosa Nostra and against the Stidda spreading death and terror among mafiosi and the public in his quest for a crime dictatorship, leaving over 500 in Cosa Nostra and over 1000 in La Stidda dead, including Stidda Capos Calogero Lauria and Vincenzo Spina.

With the 1993 capture and imprisonment of Toto Riina, along with the currently jailed Bernardo Provenzano's, "pax mafia," following a new, less violent and low key approach to criminal activities the Stidda has gained power, influence and credibility among the longer established criminal organizations within Italy and around the world, making itself an underworld player in the United States, Canada and Germany. The Stidda is sometimes called the "Fifth Mafia" in the Italian media and press.