George Mapp – I was the first to publicly break the story of Viktor Bout’s imminent transfer to Florence Colorado’s Super Maximum security prison (dubbed Supermax) to be canceled. A reliable source whom wished to remain anonymous informed me of the news last week. Approximately an hour after I tweeted the breaking news [Timeline], The Voice of Russia was the first to publish an article after my announcement.

Smulian Gets a Slap on the Wrist

Judge Shira A. Scheindlin — whom also presided over the Viktor Bout trial and sentenced him to 25 years — sentenced Andrew Smulian to 5 years. Since he served approximately 50 months already, Smulian will be able to deduct that time from his 60 month sentence and will be a free man in about 10 months. This decision was by no means surprising to me, in fact I expected Smulian to get time served thus allowing him to walk out of prison a free man yesterday. Smulian’s lawyers and the prosecution were also hoping for this outcome. As stated by a New York Times article, titled, Conduit to Arms Sting, a Star Witness Apologizes for His Crimes:

On Wednesday, Mr. Smulian’s lawyer, Mary E. Mulligan, who had asked for time served for her client, called Mr. Smulian “deeply remorseful and humble,” and cited what she called his “viable personal transformation” while assisting the government during his four years in custody.

Smulian’s lawyer also cited his ill health and the fact that he admitted his alleged crimes to the judge.

Smulian’s lawyer, Mary E. Mulligan, has asked that her client be sentenced to “time served,” citing his cooperation, his health and his acceptance of responsibility.

By law the Judge was to impose on Andrew Smulian the minimum sentence of 25 years. At age 71 and currently suffering from diabetes and high blood pressure, this would have most certainly meant a life sentence for him. However, his cooperation with the DEA and prosecutors and most notably his role in helping nab Viktor Bout was his saving grace to a drastically reduced sentence.

Viktor Bout Escapes A Life Sentence

This excerpt from the NY Times piece states why the Judge sentenced Smulian to only five years as opposed to the legal minimum sentence of 25 years.

There was no evidence, she [Judge Scheindlin] added, that had Mr. Smulian not been approached in the sting, he would ever “have been involved with terrorism.”

Here is a excerpt from my article titled, Viktor Bout Stung By DEA Operation ‘Relentless’: Sentenced to 25 Years:

The DEA sting operation dubbed ‘Relentless’ ironically may have been both Viktor Bout’s demise as well as sparing him a life behind bars in a U.S. Federal penitentiary. U.S. District Judge Shira Scheindlin said 25 years was sufficient and appropriate because there was no evidence the 45-year-old Bout would have been charged with seeking to harm Americans if not approached by informants posing as Colombian rebels.

“But for the approach made through this determined sting operation, there is no reason to believe Bout would ever have committed the charged crimes,” Scheindlin said.

It was blatantly obvious to most if not all whom actually sat through the entire trial, that if not for DEA operation ‘Relentless’, there would be no conspiracy charges against Viktor Bout. One can even insinuate from the judges behavior, demeanor, attitude and most notably by her rulings and decisions, that she felt the same.

The DEA first had to create the jurisdiction to try and convict Bout of conspiracy. To do this, they had to get Bout into The United States and into New York’s Southern District dubbed the DEA’s playground before the deadline of 20 November 2010. There has never been a terrorism case that has been lost by the prosecutor’s in New York’s Southern District. 20 November 2010 was the date that Bout’s extradition in the Royal Thai court would have legally expired. Since Viktor Bout had and still has an appeal pending in the Royal Thai court, he was removed from prison without any paperwork or legal transfers being filed. Neither his lawyer at the time nor his wife Alla had been notified when the DEA extracted him from the Thai prison to a chartered jet on 16 November 2010. Alla Bout only found out when she arrived at the Thai prison (her daily routine) to bring Viktor his vegetarian home-cooked lunch.

I wrote about it in January 2011 in Imaginary Crimes but here is an article from 26 March 2012, titled, There is nobody to represent Viktor Bout in Thailand. Here are a few excerpts:

[Lak Nitivat] Vichan (Bout’s Thai lawyer whom has died this past January) contributed to the Thai Appeals Court’s decision in 2011 to reconsider Bout’s extradition case. The same court held for Bout’s extradition after lower courts twice declined U.S. requests.

The court decided to review the case on the grounds that, first, new facts have been uncovered, according to the defense, and, second, Bout’s extradition was illegal as he was still under the Thai court’s jurisdiction. Under Thai law, the extradition order was not sufficient to extradite Bout as the court also needed to issue a permit for Bout’s transfer from prison.

In my article titled, Imaginary Crimes: The Never Ending Viktor Bout Story, I talk explicitly and extensively about the manufactured evidence and jurisdiction in this case.

Conduit to Viktor Bout

Andrew Smulian was born in Britain in 1941, he was raised in South Africa and served in its air force. Smulian a former South African pilot who also holds British citizenship eventually entered the world of intrigue and espionage. According to the New York Times in 1966, Smulian became a paid South African intelligence asset, using his air cargo company to spy on the military operations of nearby countries that opposed the apartheid regime.

Like in his testimony, Smulian often contradicted himself. Although by his own admission he was working for and supported South Africa’s apartheid regime, he latter denounced the ideology.

In a letter to the judge, Ms. Mulligan also said that although Mr. Smulian had worked for the South African government during apartheid, he “disavows the ideology of apartheid.”

It also came out in court during the testimony that Smulian was contacted by DEA informant Mike Snow whom was also a South African. Prior to contacting Smulian, Mike Snow was approached by the DEA and was asked to help them nab Viktor Bout. Snow agreed to cooperate and contacted Smulian.

Smulian first met Bout in the 1990′s and had assisted him in setting up air transportation hubs in various parts of Africa. The two had not met face-face for approximately ten years prior to their reunion in Moscow in early 2008. For the voluminous amount of evidence presented by the prosecutor’s during the trial especially all the taped phones conversations, during Smulian’s Moscow meetings, there were none. Just the word of Andrew Smulian of what was said in private between Viktor Bout and himself. There is a lot of controversy surrounding Smulian’s testimony, his motives and especially exactly when he was turned by the DEA and flipped on Viktor Bout.

Another excerpt from the previously mentioned NY Times article, the judge said:

“He was simply a financially vulnerable, out-of-work” air transporter who had known Mr. Bout, the judge said in court, and he had been used as a conduit for the government to catch the man it really wanted.

The Alleged Co-conspirator

Andrew Smulian was by far the key witness in the Viktor Bout trial and it is justifiable to say that he was the only witness that really mattered. According to a Wall Street Journal article titled, Prosecutors: Smulian Testimony ‘Crucial’ In Viktor Bout Conviction:

The testimony and assistance of a dual British-South African citizen was “crucial” in securing the conviction of notorious arms dealer Viktor Bout, prosecutors said in a court filing late Monday. Smulian’s lawyer, Mary E. Mulligan stated in the same article, “It was Mr. Smulian’s cooperation in the Bout prosecution that brought this to bear.”

The NY Times piece said this:

A prosecutor, Anjan Sahni, said Mr. Smulian’s cooperation “was indeed critical” in helping to refute Mr. Bout’s defense.

The question of motive was apparent. Smulian was broke and needed money. Dayan had shaken up Smulian quite a few times during his cross-examination. According to Dayan he was a liar. The following excerpts are from the NY Times article:

Mr. Bout’s defense lawyer, Albert Y. Dayan, in his summation at his client’s trial, called Mr. Smulian a liar who had become “intoxicated” with an arms deal that he saw as “his retirement plan.”

But in more recent years, Mr. Smulian’s business failed, and he became essentially a nomad, moving from one African country to another, living on the edge of society.

The judge also stated about Smulian:

“He was simply a financially vulnerable, out-of-work” air transporter who had known Mr. Bout, the judge said in court …”

The most shocking and telling testimony in my opinion is that Andrew Smulian admitted during testimony, on-record, to purchasing a one-way ticket to New York before he arrived or before Viktor Bout arrived in Bangkok, Thailand. The judge explained during the verdict that a conspiracy with a DEA agent and / or a DEA informant is by law not a conspiracy. Therefore, without the testimony of Andrew Smulian — there basically ain’t no case! Also, if the jury could have been convinced or if it was proven beyond a reasonable that Smulian turned on Viktor Bout before the Thailand meeting then case closed. That would deem Smulian a DEA informant and thus no conspiracy charge against Viktor Bout.

However, the real conspiracy was inside the court room and it was against Viktor Bout. You had highly paid DEA agents, DEA informants paid millions plus awaiting potential bonus’, all testifying against Bout. Mike Snow was paid, DEA informants Carlos and Ricardo were paid handsomely and Smulian was given his early freedom.

If you ignore that fact that Smulian had a one-way ticket purchased to New York prior to the arrest of Bout in Thailand, what about his intelligence background? Could he live in the same hotel room as a DEA informant, be constantly wire-tapped, given a tapped phone to use when he phone Bout and have no idea? To me it is unfathomable to imagine.

It is important to note as well, that Smulian met with the prosecutors approximately  fifty times in preparation for his testimony. As well as the fact that no part of his crucial testimony during his Moscow meetings with Viktor Bout can be verified. It is solely his word which if you read the entire transcripts of his testimony — simply does not hold water.

Lastly, it was proven in court testimony that the DEA informants were paid well, the DEA operation dubbed ‘Relentless’ spanned 3 continents and cost tax payers an estimated $500 million to pursue and catch Viktor Bout. It is also on court record that Smulian was old, broke and in ill-health when approached by DEA informant Mike Snow. For me, it is much more realistic and believable after sitting through the entire three week trial that Smulian flipped on Bout for money than to believe the nonsensical statements that don’t add up.

During the trial not once during Smulian’s appearances in the court room did he look at Viktor Bout directly over even in his vicinity. Smulian was also offered protection by the U.S. prosecutors. Smulian was apparently afraid of repercussions of his testimony, he will more than likely be offered entry into the witness protection program.

Mr. Smulian’s plea agreement states that if deemed necessary, prosecutors would takes steps to protect him and his family after his release from prison, including possibly applying for his entry into the witness protection program.

What is more intriguing than the anti-climatic sentencing of Andrew Smulian is that of the continuing curious case of Viktor Bout. There are apparently high level discussions between Washington D.C. and the Kremlin that resembles a champion chess tournament. Viktor Bout said in an exclusive interview by The Voice of Russia’s, Vasili V Sushko, via phone from prison in Brooklyn, that he will be back in Russia soon. That was approximately one month before President Putin was sworn in as President.

This article came out a few hours ago Bout Defense Prepares Extradition Request and Appeals. Apparently the only obstacle that may prevent Viktor Bout from possibly returning to his home in Russia to complete his prison sentence is a formal request to the Russian Ministry of Justice. According to Bout’s defense attorney Albert Y. Dayan, those legal procedures are currently taken place. This case has been anything but straight-forward or dull — stayed tuned for the unpredictable and intriguing case of Viktor Bout.

Here is an excerpt from the above mentioned article:

Viktor Bout, has started work on an appeal to Russian Ministry of Justice requesting his extradition from the U.S. as well as appeals to the U.S. Supreme Court and the International Court of Justice in the Hague, Bout’s lawyer Albert Dayan said.

This article was first published at Dobroyeutro’s Blog

Dobroyeutro Blog ~ News with intelligence ~ Dobroyeutro wants to share news with intelligence with our readers from around the world…to share our original articles and to encourage our readers to feel free to share their articles and ideas…to have a forum with interesting and intelligent topics in a polite and civil manner…

GIOIA TAURO – Europe is fast overtaking the U.S. as the leading destination for the world’s cocaine, and a single Italian mafia is largely responsible.

The ‚Ndrangheta crime syndicate, a ruthless and mysterious network of 155 families born in the rough hills here in southern Italy’s Calabria region, now dominates the European drug trade. By establishing direct ties with Colombian producers and building a multibillion-dollar empire that spans five continents, the syndicate has metamorphosed into one of the craftiest criminal gangs in the world, authorities say.

“ ‚Ndrangheta is king,“ said Sabas Pretelt de la Vega, a former Colombian interior minister who is his country’s ambassador to Rome.

The ‚Ndrangheta (pronounced en-DRAHN-geh-tah) peculiarly combines the modern skills of multinational-corporation high finance with a stubborn grip on archaic rural traditions. Some members live in garishly opulent villas outside Madrid and invest in bustling restaurants and hotels in Germany, whereas others, including key bosses, remain in the dreary, closed Calabrian mountain villages of their birth. It is a mafia of businessmen in Dolce & Gabbana, of sheepherders in scruffy woolens.

Its success stems from moving early and unwaveringly into cocaine trafficking while avoiding the kind of public limelight (and police crackdown) focused on its better-known Sicilian counterpart, the Mafia, or „Cosa Nostra.“

Working from „the toe of Italy’s boot,“ a region historically neglected and ignored, the ‚Ndrangheta maintains a hard-as-stone code of silence that repels most penetration efforts by police and other authorities. And because each family is a cell cooperating only loosely with other families and without a central hierarchy, the capture of a leader here or there does not even dent the organization.

Over the last two decades, the syndicate has deployed its members to strategic locations along trafficking and distribution routes, in Colombia and Venezuela, Canada, Africa, Spain and as far as Australia. It takes orders from buyers in Europe (including other mafiosi) and brokers deals with the suppliers in Colombia.

The ‚Ndrangheta gained the confidence of the Colombians, eliminated the middlemen and dealt as readily with the leftist guerrillas of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, as with the right-wing paramilitaries of the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia, or AUC, two groups that exercise major control over cocaine production in Colombia.

The personal contact, the guarantee of secrecy and the reliability of the business transactions all have made the ‚Ndrangheta mobster an appealing partner for the Colombians.

„He is seen as a man of his word. He pays in cash. He pays immediately,“ said Renato Cortese, a regional commander of the state anti-mafia police. „And he never talks.“

Expanding market
For income, the ‚Ndrangheta has chosen a lucrative and expanding market.

By some estimates, including that of Pretelt de la Vega, the Colombian diplomat, the amount of cocaine being shipped to Europe exceeds that going to the United States, a reversal of the historical pattern. Italian authorities give lower figures, saying cocaine shipments are divided half-and-half between Europe and the United States, and U.S. officials cite older statistics that show more cocaine flowing to American shores.

Whatever the amounts, no one disputes that the cocaine market in the United States has stabilized, whereas that of Europe is growing. Seizures of cocaine in Europe have doubled in the last five years, although they remain a small portion of global interceptions, according to the latest report from the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime.

Usage of cocaine in Europe, meanwhile, has skyrocketed, up by a million users last year, to 4.5 million continent-wide, according to the European Union’s drug-monitoring center in Lisbon. Leading the pack are Britain, Spain, Denmark and Italy.

„The decline in the United States is offset by alarming increases in some European countries,“ the U.N. said.

Although Cosa Nostra has dominated international headlines and popular culture for a generation, it has been eclipsed by its Calabrian counterpart in terms of power and wealth, said Nicola Gratteri, the region’s top anti-mafia prosecutor.

The ‚Ndrangheta, which is thought to have business assets worth at least $50 billion, grew as a protection racket in impoverished southern Italy after World War II and then began to make big money with kidnappings (including the abduction and grisly mutilation of the grandson of oil billionaire J. Paul Getty in 1973). The name comes from a Greek word meaning „virtue“ or „heroism.“

Eventually the group shifted to drugs and weapons trafficking, and by the ’90s was awash in cash, which it began laundering through real estate and other businesses.

A turning point
The fall of the Berlin Wall was a turning point, recalled Piero Grasso, Italy’s senior anti-mafia prosecutor. In conversations recorded by police, members of the Calabrian mob plotted a mad buying spree in the newly available former Soviet bloc. „Buy everything!“ was the watchword.

„And today they know no borders,“ Grasso said.

Here in Calabria, they also enjoy access to the Gioia Tauro port, one of the largest and busiest of the Mediterranean. Authorities say it is a transshipment point for unmeasured pounds of cocaine. Of the estimated 3,500 40-foot cargo containers that arrive daily, only about 25 are opened for inspection, so finding drugs is as much luck as skill, police say.

Suspicions were raised recently about a Uruguayan shipment to Greece marked „lemons.“ Why would a Mediterranean country like Greece need to import lemons from Uruguay? Inside a batch of rotting lemons, inspectors found 220 pounds of cocaine.

„Drugs are burying us,“ said Col. Francesco Gazzani, regional head of the Italian finance police.

In their investigations, Italian police and prosecutors working with Colombian, Spanish and U.S. authorities have recorded thousands of telephone calls and documented meetings and other communication between the ‚Ndrangheta and Colombian traffickers.

In one photographed surveillance stakeout, four people from Latin America and Calabria can be seen sitting in broad daylight at one of Milan’s most fashionable outdoor cafes, against a backdrop of rose-colored marble columns and the Duomo cathedral. They discuss a cocaine deal, then one of them casually walks to a nearby pay phone and places the order.

In another surveillance, a suspected ‚Ndrangheta gangster telephones a number in Colombia, a person with a Calabrian accent answers and then simply whistles, and the caller says, „I understand.“ Authorities say it was a signal that a shipment had departed.

One of the strongest links between the ‚Ndrangheta and the Colombians, investigators say, was Roberto Pannunzi, an alleged mafia chieftain who was one of the top cocaine brokers in the syndicate when he was arrested in 2004 as part of Operation Zappa, a five-year investigation named after a gangster code word for „gun.“

„Every important criminal figure went to him,“ said Diego Trotta, a member of an elite police squad that captured Pannunzi.

Pannunzi, 59, married his son Alessandro into a notorious family from Colombia’s Medellin cartel as a way to cement the bonds. At the height of his activities, authorities say, he was buying 3,300 to 4,400 pounds of cocaine a month. He boasted of the ease and confidence with which he handled his Colombian suppliers.

„The fact is, Barba [a Colombian trafficker] will give us everything without even a lira,“ Pannunzi told alleged ‚Ndrangheta operative Paolo Sergi, the target of another long-running probe, according to a confidential wiretap made available to The Times.

„What do you think — is the same amount available like the last time, or maybe less?“ Pannunzi’s interlocutor wonders.

„Barba, at least, told me that he has 3 million [3,000 kilograms, or 6,600 pounds, of cocaine] and I’m thinking 500 or 700,“ Pannunzi responds, using a numeric code for the price.

A beefy man with dark wavy hair, Pannunzi amassed such an enormous fortune, investigators say, that he at one point simply threw away millions of dollars worth of liras because the bills had been stacked so high and for so long that they became moldy.

Back to ancestral home
Perhaps one of the most surprising features of the ‚Ndrangheta is that despite its fortunes, its members always come back to their ancestral home in Calabria, almost as a spiritual touchstone. Though they form clones of their home villages the world over, an internal code obliges them to report back to the mother ship, said Gratteri, the top regional ant-mafia prosecutor.

„You have to look at what this place gives them. Each top ‚Ndranghista is an emperor,“ said Gratteri, whose work has earned him round-the-clock bodyguards and transport in an armored car.

„He has the perverse pleasure to be able to decide the life or death of 3,000, 5,000, maybe 10,000 people. He decides who lives. He decides who is going to be mayor. He decides who is going to win the state contracts. For the perverse mind, this is very gratifying.“

Each family assigns a member to a certain criminal enterprise; if a son is good in math, he might get the loan-shark business, whereas an engineer would handle the acquisition of lucrative state building contracts, a major area of corruption.

The tightness of the family network also has thwarted efforts by authorities to infiltrate the crime gang. Several years ago, when the government offered reduced jail time to mafiosi who would inform on their cohorts, hundreds of Cosa Nostra operatives ‚fessed up. But only a few people associated with the ‚Ndrangheta agreed to become turncoats, and most of these were such minor figures that they had little to offer.

„Every clan is a little Sparta,“ militarized and willing to fight to the end, often egged on by the women of the family, said anti-mafia prosecutor Alberto Cisterna.

Through the years, most killings by the ‚Ndrangheta have been the result of internal feuds or have targeted relatively low-level officials, inspiring little public outrage. That changed last summer with a bloody ambush outside a pizzeria in Duisburg, Germany. At least two gunmen from one ‚Ndrangheta family killed six members of a rival clan, shocking Italians and Germans because of the brutality of the attack and the extent to which the mafia had settled in Germany.

The slayings were the latest explosion of a long-running internal feud that had at its root a power struggle over territory and business, investigators say.

In the more than four months since the Duisburg massacre, Italian and German police have arrested about 40 suspected mobsters, men and women. But no one has any illusions that this represents a setback for the Calabrian mafia.

“ ‚Ndrangheta are the leader in Europe when it comes to trafficking cocaine,“ Gratteri said, „and their trafficking is getting stronger all the time.“

Daniele Mariani – Swissinfo – Die kriminellen italienischen Organisationen, namentlich die ‚Ndrangheta, sind zuoberst auf der Sorgenliste der Schweizer Regierung. Einige Experten sind jedoch der Ansicht, die Schweiz sei schlecht gerüstet für den Kampf gegen die Mafia.

„Die grösste Gefahr stellt die ‚Ndrangheta dar.“ Das ist das klare Fazit der Schweizer Strategie zur Bekämpfung des organisierten Verbrechens 2012-2015, welche der Bundesrat Ende März 2012 bekanntgab.

Auch wenn keine schweren Bluttaten wie jene im deutschen Duisburg 2007 (Ermordung von sechs Kalabresen) registriert wurden, sind die ‚Ndrine – die Zellen – in der Schweiz bereits gut installiert.

Für die Fachleute ertönt die Alarmglocke der Schweizer Regierung nicht überraschend. Denn seit Jahren betonen Justizbehörden, Polizei und einige Politiker, dass die italienischen Mafia-Organisationen ihre Präsenz in der Schweiz verstärken.

Eine echte physische Präsenz, die sich akzentuiert hat infolge des Drucks auf die Mafia in Italien und durch die „Eroberung“ des Nordens, bestätigt durch die kürzlich erfolgte Verhaftungswelle in der Lombardei.

Zahlreiche Beweise und Indizien
Beweise und Indizien für diese Präsenz in der Schweiz sind vorhanden: Im Mai 2011 wurde zum Beispiel ein gefährliches ‚Ndrangheta-Mitglied, das ungestört in Frauenfeld, Kanton Thurgau, lebte, in Genua festgenommen.

Wenige Monate zuvor hatte die Antimafia-Behörde von Reggio Calabria am Ende ihrer Operation ‚Crimine 2‘ die internationale Vernetzung der kalabresischen Zellen aufgezeigt, mit wichtigen Ablegern in Deutschland und auch in der Schweiz, besonders in Frauenfeld und in Zürich. „An diesen Orten wurde das Strukturmodell der kalabresischen ‚Ndrangheta nachgebildet“, schrieb der italienische Ermittlungsrichter.

Die aufgezeichneten Abhöraktionen in den Ermittlungsakten lassen keine Zweifel offen. Zum Beispiel in einem Telefongespräch, das auf einen so genannten „‚Ntono dalla Svizzera“ anspielt, der den im Juli 2010 in Italien verhafteten Clanchef Giuseppe Antonio Primerano ersucht hat, seine eigene Herrschaft auch in Deutschland und später in der Schweiz ausüben zu können.

Oder als Domenico Oppedisano – der Boss der Bosse, der ebenfalls im Juli 2010 festgenommen wurde – von einer „Bürgschaft von 20 Millionen auf einer Bank in der Schweiz“ spricht.

Aus naheliegenden geografischen Gründen erregt die Situation vor allem in den Kantonen Tessin und Wallis Besorgnis, wie Jean-Luc Vez in einem Interview mit der Waadtländer Zeitung 24 heures erklärte. Der Chef der Bundespolizei, verantwortlich für die Untersuchungen gegen kriminelle italienische Organisationen, wollte sich jedoch nicht zu den laufenden Ermittlungen äussern.

Die Schweiz werde von den Mafiosi besonders geschätzt „wegen ihrer Wirtschaft und ihrem Finanzplatz, ebenso wegen ihrer Infrastruktur“, sagt die Bundesanwaltschaft.

Die Schweiz sei eine Art logistische Plattform, wo man Geld waschen könne, und zwar nicht nur via Banken und Treuhänder, sondern auch mit Investitionen in Immobilien.

Oder ein Ort, wo man illegalen Handel aufziehen oder Unterschlupf suchen könne: „2010 wurden viele Angehörige von kriminellen italienischen Organisationen, darunter der ‚Ndrangheta, in ihr Heimatland ausgeliefert, wo sie bereits zu langen Haftstrafen verurteilt worden sind“, heisst es im Jahresbericht der Bundespolizei.

„Einige von ihnen hatten auch in der Schweiz Straftaten begangen, vor allem Drogenhandel. Andere dagegen haben während langer Zeit eine normale Arbeit in der Schweiz ausgeführt, ohne aufzufallen.“

Besser spät als nie
Schon vor 25 Jahren hatte der Antimafia-Richter Giovanni Falcone seine Schweizer Amtskollegen davor gewarnt, dass nach den Mafia-Geldern auch die Mafiosi selber ins Land kämen.

Ist man in der Schweiz nicht etwas spät erwacht? Die Bundesanwaltschaft weist darauf hin, dass seit 1994 – mit der Aufnahme ins Strafrecht des Deliktes „Beteiligung oder Unterstützung einer kriminellen Organisation“ – die Strafmassnahmen auf Bundesebene koordiniert würden. Und seit 10 Jahren läge die Verfahrenskompetenz bei der Bundesanwaltschaft.

„Besser spät als nie“, sagt dazu Nicolas Giannakopoulos, Gründer des Observatoriums für organisierte Kriminalität in Genf. „Endlich hat man sich entschieden, den Stier bei den Hörnern zu packen. Jetzt muss man schauen, wie das Problem angegangen werden kann. Je mehr man zaudert, desto schwieriger wird es, eine Spur zu verfolgen. Das einzige Mittel wäre, viel enger mit den italienischen Behörden zusammenzuarbeiten, denn alles beginnt in Italien und kommt wieder nach Italien zurück.“

Ausreichende Mittel?
Ein erster Schritt in diese Richtung war die Ernennung von Bundesanwalt Pierluigi Pasi, der in Lugano residiert, zum Koordinator für Antimafia-Aktionen.

„Wir verfügen über ausreichende Mittel“, sagt die Bundesanwaltschaft. Sie betont, dass die Schaffung dieser neuen Funktion „ein konkretes Beispiel“ sei, das den Willen zur Optimierung der Ressourcen und zur Koordinierung der Ermittlungen mit den italienischen Untersuchungsbehörden beweise. Eine Zusammenarbeit, die der italienische Antimafia-Generalstaatsanwalt Pietro Grasso in einem Interview mit der Tribune de Genève als „exzellent“ bezeichnete.

Oft wird das föderalistische System der Schweiz als wenig geeignet zur Bekämpfung solcher Delikte angesehen. Die präzise Aufgabenteilung zwischen Bund und Kantonen, die zum Beispiel die Bekämpfung des Drogenhandels den kantonalen Polizeibehörden und die Untersuchungen gegen das organisierte Verbrechen und die Geldwäscherei der Bundespolizei zuweist, sei zweifelsohne ein Hindernis, sagen Experten, die anonym bleiben wollen. Im allgemeinen funktioniere aber die Kooperation, auch wenn alles natürlich von den betroffenen Personen abhänge.

Die Schwierigkeit sei eine andere, so die Fachleute. Die Untersuchungen – an und für sich schon sehr komplex, wenn es um extrem undurchlässige Organisationen wie die ‚Ndrangheta gehe – würden noch schwieriger wegen der Einschränkungen bei gewissen Ermittlungsmethoden, wie Abhöraktionen, Beschattungen oder Eindringen in Informatiksysteme. Es nützte nicht viel, wenn diese Methoden erst dann verwendet werden könnten, wenn Beweise vorlägen.

Nach Italien ausrichten
Nicolas Giannakopoulos teilt die Analyse: „Alles ist sehr kompliziert, mit extremen Verfahrensaspekten, wie die jüngsten Fälle zeigen. Wir müssen uns von Italien inspirieren lassen, zum Beispiel was Massnahmen betrifft wie Vermögens- und Güterbeschlagnahmung, die sehr gut funktionieren, oder die Schaffung von dichten Antimafia-Spezialpools. Die Rechtsstruktur der Schweiz ist dazu ungeeignet. Um die Mafia zu bekämpfen, funktionieren Methoden nicht, die gegen Hühnerdiebe angewendet werden.“

Eine Beurteilung, die manche sicher zu karikaturartig finden. Die Bundesanwaltschaft ist der Meinung, dass die derzeitigen gesetzlichen Bestimmungen ausreichende Möglichkeiten garantieren, um das organisierte Verbrechen zu bekämpfen.

Eine Aufgabe, die der im September 2011 nominierte neue Leiter der Bundesanwaltschaft, Michael Lauber, bestens kennt. Er leitete von 1995 bis 2000 die Zentralstelle Organisierte Kriminalität im Bundesamt für Polizei. Ein weiteres Signal dafür, dass die Schweizer Regierung wirklich gewillt ist, das Problem bei den Hörnern zu packen.