GIOVANNI FALCONE: THE ANTI-MAFIA SCIENTIST
- Lucas Manjon
- 3 days ago
- 25 min read
Updated: 1 day ago
Giovanni Falcone was an Italian judge who pioneered the implementation and development of new investigative methods, such as using informants and tracking money. Through these two practices, he secured convictions against nearly 400 mobsters and introduced a scientific approach to pursuing criminals. Here’s part of his story.
At 5:57 PM on May 23, 1992, a convoy of armored Fiat Croma cars was moving at a speed that was unusual. It was slower than on other weekends. It didn’t exceed 100 kilometers per hour and took a few minutes longer than usual to reach the Capaci exit on the A29 highway. One minute later, the communication between two mobsters was cut off, and four seconds after that, a bomb of nearly 1,000 kilos of TNT exploded right under the first car in the convoy. At 5:58 PM on May 23, 1992, the Capaci massacre began to take shape. Maybe it had already started earlier, when other mobsters watched the convoy leave Punta Raisi airport. The first car, a brown Croma carrying police officers Antonio Montinaro, Vito Schifani, and Rocco Dicillo, flew several meters off the highway and crashed into a grove, killing all three instantly. The second car, the white Croma driven by Giovanni Falcone, slammed head-on into chunks of asphalt lifted by the bomb blast underneath the pavement, in a drainage tunnel crossing beneath the highway. Giovanni was accompanied by his wife, Judge Francesca Morvillo. The convoy was moving slower than usual because that day Giovanni had insisted on driving. Naturally, he drove at a slower speed than any of his police escorts, who were seasoned experts at high speed driving. Giuseppe Costanza, the assigned police officer and driver, was in the backseat — fate was on his side that day. Judge Giovanni and Judge Francesca weren’t wearing seat belts, though it wouldn’t have made a difference. The concrete suddenly lifted, the car slammed hard at high speed, and the bodies of the two front-seat occupants smashed directly into the windshield. Both were trapped. The occupants of the third car, a blue Croma driven by police officers Paolo Capuzza, Gaspare Cervelló, and Angelo Corbo, survived the explosion. After the natural confusion of hearing a bomb detonate less than ten meters away, they got out and positioned themselves near the second car to protect it from a possible second attack. The death of the judge who had largely changed how the mafia was investigated — both in mindset and methods — was a top priority. Anything else could follow.
Giovanni Salvatore Augusto Falcone was born on May 18, 1939, in the city of Palermo, on the island of Sicily, into a respected middle-class family of professionals, well-known and valued throughout much of the city—though surely not without their detractors. His father, Arturo, was the director of the Provincial Laboratory of Hygiene and Prophylaxis at the Palermo City Council. His mother, Luisa Bentivegna, was a homemaker and the daughter of a well-known gynecologist. The family was completed by Giovanni’s two older sisters. As a child, Giovanni attended Giovanni Verga Elementary School and later Liceo Umberto I, both located in central Palermo. With a strong and energetic personality, he maintained an active social life beyond his academic duties. He was deeply involved in the sporting and recreational activities organized by Catholic Action. In a youth shaped as much by the geography of his neighborhood as by the unpredictable rhythm of history, he shared many of these activities with another boy from the area—Paolo Borsellino—a friendship that would endure for life. After finishing high school, Giovanni briefly moved to the city of Livorno with the intention of becoming a naval engineer. Just four months later, however, he abandoned that path and returned to his native Palermo. There, he enrolled at the University of Palermo and began his studies in law.
The early years of the Falcone family were spent in the historic and densely populated Kalsa district, known for its Arab architectural heritage, in a house located at 1 Castrofilippo Street, just a few steps from Piazza Maggione. Kalsa had been one of the neighborhoods most heavily affected by the American and British bombings during World War II. By the late 1950s and early 1960s, a practice had begun in Palermo that would eventually spread to nearly every country in the world. The top leaders of the Christian Democracy party—the dominant political force of the era—granted several Cosa Nostra families the power to demolish the city’s historic and cultural heritage in order to replace it with modern, automated, and poorly constructed buildings that radically altered the appearance of the old city. Building permits were predominantly awarded to companies controlled by the Mafia. These construction projects served two purposes: they provided a controlled source of employment that the Mafia could leverage during elections, and they acted as an endless opportunity to launder money earned through extortion, smuggling, and heroin trafficking to the United States. Giovanni and his family were among those who suffered the speculative and criminal decisions behind the urban policies dictated by the Palermo City Council and the Mafia during those years. Their house was slated for demolition, and they were forced to move.
Giovanni completed his law degree in 1961. A year later, he met and fell in love with Rita Bonnici, a young primary school teacher who introduced him to socialist ideas and opened the door to a new world—one far removed from the tradition and Catholic faith so deeply rooted in the Falcone household. Two years into their relationship, while Giovanni was preparing for and passing the exam required to enter the judiciary, the couple married at the Basilica of the Holy Trinity of the Chancellor in Palermo. Giovanni’s first assignment as a magistrate was in the small town of Lentini, in the province of Syracuse. He and Rita later moved to the city of Trapani, on the opposite side of the island, where he began to mature both politically and legally in his role as magistrate. Life for the young couple in Trapani was truly peaceful, with a vibrant social life that Rita promoted, and which Giovanni - when his reserved nature allowed- would sometimes join and try to enjoy. After ten years of marriage and working in the judiciary, the relationship with Rita was particularly strained. Life in Trapani was not what Giovanni had expected. Two years later, in 1978, Giovanni requested a transfer to the capital and was appointed magistrate in the bankruptcy division of the Palermo court—but his journey ended there. His marriage to Rita had already ended when she informed him that she was in love with Cristoforo Genna, a colleague of his.
The 1970s and 1980s were particularly painful decades for Italians, especially for Sicilians. In the north of the country, far-left and far-right groups carried out a variety of politically motivated attacks. In the south, Mafia families were killing each other—and even began targeting state officials. Judicial investigations led by certain branches of the justice system and police started to disrupt drug trafficking operations, making the days and nights in the western part of Sicily smell of blood and gunpowder. In March 1979, Michele Reina, the provincial secretary of the Christian Democracy party in Palermo, was murdered. In July, while having an espresso and waiting for an informant who never showed up or arrived too late, Boris Giuliano—the head of Palermo’s Mobile Squad—was assassinated. Two months later, on September 25, 1979, Mafia families centered around the impoverished region of Corleone killed Cesare Terranova, an investigating judge at the Palermo court. With him was his bodyguard Lenin Mancuso, the “guardian angel,” as Terranova’s widow called him. Terranova was shot to death outside his home, in his car, on his way to his office. He was succeeded by magistrate Rocco Chinnici. But the Cosa Nostra was not satisfied and continued their killings. On May 4, 1980, Emanuele Basile, the captain of the Carabinieri in Monreale, was shot multiple times in the back—and his daughter was in his arms at the time. On August 6, prosecutor Gaetano Costa—who had ordered the arrest of fifty-six mafiosi, the same ones investigated by Basile—was also murdered, shot several times in the back.
From the moment he took office at the Palace of Justice in Palermo—a monumental building with architectural roots steeped in fascist tradition—magistrate Rocco Chinnici set out to transform the investigative approach to the Mafia. Until then, investigations had been fragmented and compartmentalized across various offices, progressing or stalling depending on the drive, dedication, and ingenuity of individual officials. Under Rocco’s leadership, all magistrates under his charge were required to meet weekly to share information with their colleagues, enriching each other’s cases. Rocco’s paradigm and method would lay the foundation for his theory—that the Mafia was a complex, organized, and hierarchical criminal structure. Although Giovanni had already begun familiarizing himself judicially with Mafia-related matters during his time in Trapani, upon arriving in Palermo after the assassination of Cesare Terranova, he accepted Rocco’s repeated invitation to work alongside him.
His first investigation was the one originally started by Boris Giuliano and later handled by Emanuele Basile and Gaetano Costa—all of whom were ultimately killed by the Cosa Nostra. The case involved the most powerful Mafia families in Sicily and the United States, a large number of national and international banks, much of Italian politics—mainly Sicilian, but also Vatican politics—and many representatives from the business sector. Among these businessmen—though he could just as well be counted among the Mafia leaders—was Rosario Spatola, a former milk vendor who had transformed into a successful entrepreneur thanks to the business dealings of his cousins Salvatore Inzirello and Carlo Gambino, the boss of the Passo di Rigano family in Palermo and one of the five heads of the Mafia families in New York City, respectively. Spatola laundered money through the frequent and lucrative building demolition and construction permits granted during Palermo’s years of plunder. He also offered his properties for his Sicilian Mafia relatives and Marseille-based chemists to set up heroin production labs. Additionally, he funneled heroin trafficking profits into the international financial system—mainly between the United States and Sicily.
The investigation proved to be so vast and complex that it sparked in Giovanni the need to create a method that could later be applied to other criminal cases involving money laundering. He believed that such cases should rely on objective and indisputable evidence. Reconstructing the path—the hands, accounts, and investments through which the money passed—was that method. Money leaves traces along its entire journey. In the summer of 1982, the Palermo Investigative Court, under Giovanni Falcone’s charge, issued a “collaboration” order to all banks and currency exchange offices in the Palermo and Trapani regions, requiring them to report all foreign currency exchange transactions—mainly from dollars to lira—carried out since 1975. The judicial order caused great concern and unrest among bankers linked to the Mafia, as well as throughout the Sicilian business community, many of whom had familial, commercial, coercive, or financial ties to the Cosa Nostra.
Threats were becoming increasingly frequent among magistrates handling investigations connected to the Mafia in one way or another. Until the murders of Judges Terranova and Costa, judges usually did not have bodyguards—the Mafia did not kill officials. After all that changed, Giovanni’s life became one constantly shared with police officers. The threats, the security detail, and the rising levels of work and violence disrupted the routine and the couple’s life that Giovanni tried to maintain with Francesca. Francesca Laura Morvillo was born on December 14, 1945. She was a magistrate and had met Giovanni at a friends’ dinner in 1979. They quickly began a relationship that they kept secret for a long time. She was the daughter of magistrate Guido Morvillo and the sister of magistrate Alfredo Morvillo, Giovanni’s colleague. But above all, she was a young magistrate who had become a lawyer at 22, graduated top of her class, one of Italy’s first female judges, the magistrate of Agrigento, and a meticulous juvenile prosecutor in Palermo. She was also separated in fact and involved with another man—another famous judge—who was also separated, and according to gossip in the jet set, for reasons involving third parties.
The mafiosi from the Corleone region, who had begun a meteoric and bloody rise in 1958, launched a new war in 1981—the first one had taken place in the 1960s but did not feature them as protagonists—against the most powerful and traditional Mafia families of Palermo, the city where the Mafia originated. The Corleonesi’s ruthless hunt, especially targeting the Bontate and Inzerillo families, prompted Palermo’s Mobile Squad—led by Ninni Cassarà—to map out the new structure of the Cosa Nostra. In a report titled “Michelle Grecco + 161,” police and judicial authorities detailed the names, areas of influence, and types of activities carried out by the warring families, with special focus on those emerging victorious. This work was the result of a long and dangerous effort by Ninni Cassarà and officers Beppe Montana and Calogero Zucchetto, among others. Calogero, a 28-year-old who had spent his entire childhood in Palermo, knew many of the mafiosi personally. He had informants in bars, nightclubs, brothels, and markets. Thanks to this deep knowledge of the men and the terrain—like a battlefield—Calogero was able to establish contact with Salvatore Contorno, a mafioso who survived the Corleonesi war and agreed to become a pentito—a repentant informant and collaborator with justice, or an infamous traitor, depending on who defined him.
In April 1982, the Corleonesi—already clear victors in the Mafia war—gunned down communist trade union politician Pio La Torre and his party colleague Rosario Di Salvo. La Torre had been a parliamentary ally of Judge Terranova in the national Parliament, and together they had presented a report to the Anti-Mafia Commission accusing several Christian Democracy leaders in Sicily of maintaining criminal and economic ties with the Cosa Nostra. They had also worked on modifying the penal code, proposing to include the crime of Mafia association and the possibility of seizing assets from these organizations. Just a few months later, on September 3, the same Soviet-made Kalashnikov rifles were used to assassinate General and Palermo Prefect Carlo Alberto Dalla Chiesa along with his wife, Emanuela Setti Carraro. The next day, the national Parliament approved Pio La Torre’s proposal, marking a new chapter in the fight against the Mafia. In November of that same year, Calogero Zucchetto was also murdered.
In 1983, the investigation into Spatola and the other mafiosi charged years earlier by Gaetano Costa came to an end. The Mafia businessman was sentenced to ten years in prison for money laundering, along with seventy-five other mafiosi. The outcome of that trial institutionalized—not only in Italy—Falcone’s method: reconstructing the money trail. After the verdict against Spatola and the others, Rocco Chinnici formed and institutionalized a group of magistrates fully dedicated to investigating the Mafia. This team, historically recognized as the Antimafia Pool, was made up of Giovanni Falcone himself, Paolo Borsellino, Giuseppe Di Lello, and Leonardo Guarnotta. The strategy defined by Rocco and the team’s results increased the risk levels for all magistrates involved. On July 29, 1983, as Rocco left his apartment on Via Pipitone Federico, a green Fiat 126 parked just meters from the entrance exploded, carrying 75 kilos of TNT. The blast killed Rocco, his two bodyguards—police officers Mario Trapassi and Salvatore Bartolotta—and the building’s doorman, Stefano Li Sacchi. The murder of Rocco caught Giovanni in Bangkok, where he was interrogating Koh Bak Kin, a Chinese trafficker linked to the Cosa Nostra. The death of his friend and colleague left an immeasurable void and seriously raised concerns about his own safety and that of those around him. It also made him aware of the Mafia’s strategy: guaranteeing effectiveness—or at least shock—and broadcasting the consequences live, directly impacting Palermo’s society.
Rocco’s assassination not only disrupted the presumed stability of Giovanni’s position but also left the Palermo Court in urgent need of a successor capable of matching his predecessor. Antonino Caponnetto was an assistant prosecutor in Florence—over a thousand kilometers away from Sicily—and had limited judicial experience with the Mafia phenomenon. He also did not know most of the magistrates working on such cases. Despite his family’s objections, Antonino put himself forward as Rocco’s successor for the Investigative Court of Palermo. His nomination was swiftly approved by the Judiciary Council. Antonino moved to Sicily to lead the court, support the work of the Antimafia Pool, and lived for a long time in a room within a Carabinieri barracks.
The massacre of bosses and their relatives carried out by the Corleonesi came to an end in 1984. Most of the victims were not bosses themselves. Family members—whether or not involved in the criminal activities of their relatives—were killed. The Corleonesi leader, Salvatore Riina, ordered the killing of relatives up to the twentieth degree of kinship if they could not get to the mafioso they were targeting. Tommaso Buscetta, an associate of the Porta Nuova Mafia family, was one of those who suffered the greatest human losses during that war. He was also one of the many teenagers who, forty years earlier, had shared activities and recreational spaces with the young Giovanni on the streets of the Kalsa neighborhood. Buscetta had been on the run from Italian justice for several years. Using the false identity of Paolo Roberto Felici, he had hidden from both the law and the Corleonesi in Brazil. On October 23, 1983, he was arrested in a mansion in São Paulo alongside his wife, his four children, and the son of the former boss of Cinisi, Leonardo Badalamenti—another target of the victors of the second war. In just a couple of years, the hitmen of the new Cosa Nostra leadership had killed eleven of Buscetta’s relatives: two of his sons, a brother, a nephew, a son-in-law, and four nephews. After his arrest in São Paulo, he was transferred to Brasília—the capital of Brazil—and for over a year, he received visits from various Italian judicial officials—including Giovanni Falcone—who tried to convince him to become a “pentito,” a repentant collaborator with justice, or an “infamous” traitor to the mafiosi. Buscetta politely and systematically rejected their offers. He even attempted suicide to avoid extradition to Italy, but he failed.
Buscetta’s stance changed when he arrived in Rome, escorted by Italian security forces, his handcuffed hands covered with a blanket, and was placed in the Rome Police Headquarters. Immediately after his extradition, he agreed to speak with Giovanni—the man he had briefly met as teenagers, who had never crossed paths again until that moment and who had chosen two completely opposite life paths. One had become one of Italy’s most important criminal justice officials; the other, a mafioso who had built strong ties with the most powerful Cosa Nostra families and had enriched himself through drug trafficking. He had also lost eleven relatives in less than two years. From their first meetings, Buscetta began giving Giovanni a detailed description of how the organization was structured, how it operated, who made it up, and even how new mafiosi could become part of the Cosa Nostra. He also warned him of the suffering that possession of such knowledge would bring. “I warn you, judge. After this interrogation, you may become a celebrity, but your life will be marked. They will try to destroy you physically and professionally. Don’t forget, your score with the Cosa Nostra will never be settled.” For more than a month, Giovanni listened as Buscetta denounced the new leadership of the Cosa Nostra, condemning the new bosses who defiled the supposed code of honor and the moral values of the old Mafia.
In September 1984, the investigation into the Cosa Nostra accelerated thanks to Buscetta’s testimonies, but it was still not complete. However, Giovanni’s suspicions of a possible leak forced him to execute over 350 arrest warrants in one single night, across various locations in the country. The risk of such a leak reached Giovanni’s ears when a journalist from the newspaper L’Espresso showed up at the courthouse asking about matters that had until then been confidential. Giovanni decided to hold the journalist in his office. He kept him there for several hours until Giuseppe Di Lello was awakened and able to sign the necessary documents to carry out those arrest warrants. In what became known as the “San Michele bombardment,” on September 29 — the day of the Archangel Michael — law enforcement executed the majority of the arrest orders. Only a few mafiosi managed to escape. The investigation into the Cosa Nostra continued, now incorporating testimonies from a new informant or “pentito” — depending on who called him what — Salvatore Contorno, the mafioso who survived an assassination attempt and whom the police officer Calogero Zucchetto convinced to cooperate. Contorno’s statements reinforced Buscetta’s and gave the investigation a new boost. The pressure from justice and law enforcement made the Cosa Nostra leaders react. In 1985, they ordered a fresh wave of murders. In July, police officer Beppe Montana was killed. In August, Ninni Cassarà and Roberto Antiochia, both police officers, were assassinated. These were three of the closest collaborators of the antimafia pool. Rumors circulated through the streets, the hallways of the Palace of Justice, and the island’s prisons, pointing to Giovanni and Paolo Borsellino as the next targets of the Cosa Nostra.
Giovanni and Francesca’s relationship bore the heavy toll of their hectic and perilous life. Giovanni decided not to have children — “you don’t bring orphans into the world, you bring children.” He also wasn’t sure about getting married — “you don’t leave widows in the world.” Because the risk to their lives was so high, in order to finish the indictment and bring to trial more than 700 mafiosi accused of being part of or collaborating with the Cosa Nostra, Giovanni and Paolo — along with their families — moved into the maximum-security prison of Asinara, on the island of Sardinia. Giovanni, Francesca, Paolo, and their families lived for more than a month behind reinforced walls, bars, and wire fences. It was only on November 8, 1985, when the two magistrates completed the indictment titled “Abbate, Giovanni + 706,” that they left the island and returned to their lives on the other island. A month later, Giovanni and Paolo had to pay 415,000 lire for the lodging and food during their stay with their families in the prison. Such are the peculiarities of the antimafia fight.
The following year would be a pivotal one for Giovanni, both professionally and personally. On February 10, 1986, the mega-trial against Cosa Nostra began. It was called the Maxiprocesso di Palermo—a name that would come to be used repeatedly whenever a large-scale trial against the mafia took place, involving a significant number of indicted mafiosi. To carry out the trial, 36 billion lire were invested in the construction of a courtroom specifically for the proceedings. It looked more like a bunker than a courtroom—because that’s essentially what it was. It featured a fortified defense system and walls capable of withstanding rocket or missile attacks. Detention cells were installed inside the courtroom, along with 850 square meters of bulletproof glass, making it even more secure than the Palermo prison of Ucciardone, the very site where it was being built.
In the midst of the trial—and with the feeling that a large part of the work was done (though many of the Cosa Nostra’s top leaders were still fugitives, and the complicity of politicians and businessmen was being investigated in a separate case)—Giovanni and Francesca decided to celebrate their love. They had managed to finalize their divorces and had been living together for at least four years in an apartment on Via Notarbartolo—the street named after the first official innocent victim of the Sicilian mafia. They were married in an intimate ceremony attended by only a small group of family and friends. The union was officiated by Leoluca Orlando, the mayor of Palermo. The witnesses were a close friend of Francesca and Antonino Caponnetto, the leader of the anti-mafia pool. That evening, the newlyweds welcomed a few more friends than had attended the ceremony—though not too many. Giovanni couldn’t bear to be seen celebrating while so much suffering still surrounded him.
On December 16, 1987—after 21 months, 638 days, and 349 hearings—the Maxiprocesso di Palermo came to an end. It had begun with 475 defendants charged with 120 murders, drug trafficking, extortion, and mafia association. The trial concluded with 339 convictions, 19 life sentences, a combined total of 2,665 years in prison, and fines amounting to 11.5 billion lire.The Maxiprocesso had already become a political, judicial, and cultural milestone. It marked a true turning point in the fight against the mafia. Almost immediately after the verdicts were handed down, defense attorneys began preparing their appeals, while much of the political class turned its attention—more accurately, its concern—to halting ongoing investigations that threatened to expose inconvenient truths about their pasts and interests. Borsellino left the anti-mafia pool and became the Prefect of Marsala, the most populous city in the province of Trapani. Antonino Caponnetto awaited the order to return to Florence and hand over leadership to Giovanni. However, part of the political establishment and the Consiglio Superiore della Magistratura—the governing body of the Italian judiciary—had other plans for him.
The anti-mafia campaign that, over the years, had been carried out by a group of judges and prosecutors—with Giovanni at the forefront—was met with disapproval from a significant portion of Sicilian society. Many preferred to continue denying the mafia’s existence, even as they suffered under its control. This stance was equally unwelcome among politicians who maintained close ties with Cosa Nostra—ties that were beginning to come to light through the judiciary’s work. Members of the pool, Giovanni’s colleagues, and segments of the political sphere who recognized the value of his efforts supported and endorsed him as the natural successor to Antonino Caponnetto. However, the opposing faction managed—at the last minute—to put forward magistrate Antonino Meli for the position. Meli was a career judge, nearing retirement, with no experience in mafia trials. Yet, he was ultimately selected. This setback deeply discouraged Giovanni. He began to feel that he was no longer facing only the mafia, but also a new group of adversaries: his own critics from within the system.
Following the appointment, Antonino Meli initiated a public confrontation with Giovanni and the other members of the anti-mafia pool. The new chief publicly—and judicially—rejected the notion of the mafia as a structured and hierarchical organization, a concept that had been confirmed by the Maxiprocesso ruling. At the same time, he ordered the complete dismantling of the anti-mafia pool, suspended ongoing trials, and redistributed the cases among various offices—effectively destroying the coherence and advantages of the team’s collective work. Pressure on Giovanni intensified with each new investigation he launched, many of which aimed to expose the complicity of certain political figures, business elites, and major media outlets with Cosa Nostra. A new era was beginning—one in which a campaign of public slander against Giovanni began to circulate. Though loosely orchestrated, it was highly strategic. In the beginning—only in the beginning—this reminded him of a letter published in the Giornale di Sicilia by a neighbor in his apartment building. The neighbor complained about the constant noise of police sirens from the escort vehicles assigned to protect the judges: "...a law-abiding citizen who pays taxes regularly and works eight hours a day. Every day (weekends make no difference), in the morning, at lunchtime, in the early afternoon, and at night (without any schedule limits), I am literally harassed by the continuous and deafening sirens of the police cars escorting the various judges. Now I ask myself: is it not possible for us to get a little rest during work breaks—or at least watch a television program in peace—given that, even with the windows shut, the sound of the sirens is unbearably loud?"
The first slanders circulating about Giovanni were mostly personal—and rather absurd, considering the gravity of his work. He was accused of being vain, egocentric, and of using the fight against the mafia as a stepping stone for his professional advancement. But the tone of these accusations soon turned much more serious—and far more dangerous for Giovanni’s safety. Letters began circulating in the hallways of the Palermo courthouse, reaching the offices of high-ranking officials before eventually being leaked to the press. Many of them even bore the letterhead of certain State agencies. In those letters, Giovanni was accused of siding with the "old mafia"—the faction that the Corleonesi had decimated just a few years earlier. It was early June 1989 when Salvatore Contorno, a mafia defector turned pentito like Tommaso Buscetta, was arrested in Sicily. The letters—six in total—claimed that Giovanni, along with members of the security forces, had authorized Contorno’s return to the island so that he could locate and assassinate Totò Riina—the supreme boss of Cosa Nostra, who ordered killings and bombings. Some media outlets went so far as to claim that Contorno was a "hitman for the State" or even Giovanni’s personal assassin. The judicial investigation opened in response to these letters ultimately targeted members of the judiciary themselves—referred to in mafia slang as "the crows," a derogatory nickname inspired by the black robes worn by magistrates in court.
In addition to being the target of defamation throughout what would later be known as "the season of poison," Giovanni and Francesca suffered their first assassination attempt. On June 21, 1989, while vacationing at a villa in Addaura—on the southern edge of the border between Palermo and Mondello—Giovanni’s security detail discovered a backpack containing 58 kilograms of TNT. The explosives had been hidden just days before the couple’s arrival at the villa. Whether by luck or by technical failure, the remote-control device intended to trigger the bomb malfunctioned. The perpetrators failed in their mission, but they succeeded in heightening the fear and alarm felt by Giovanni, Francesca, and his security team. Giovanni immediately suspected that the attack had been orchestrated by Cosa Nostra. However, the high level of sophistication behind the attempt—far more advanced than in previous threats—led him to suspect that corrupt elements within the Italian intelligence services might also have been involved. These factions, commonly referred to as the “deviated” services, had long been rumored to have shadowy ties to criminal networks. The attempted bombing in Addaura put the strength of the Falcone–Morvillo marriage to the test once again. The couple argued frequently, and Giovanni went as far as to ask Francesca to end the relationship—believing that, as long as they were together, the danger to his life also extended fatally to hers.
In addition to being the target of defamation during what would later be known as “the season of poison,” Giovanni and Francesca endured their first assassination attempt. On June 21, 1989, while vacationing at a villa in Addaura—on the southern edge of the border between Palermo and Mondello—Giovanni’s security detail discovered a backpack containing 58 kilograms of TNT. The explosives had been planted just days before the couple’s arrival. Whether due to luck or technical failure, the remote-control device meant to trigger the bomb did not work. The attackers failed to achieve their goal, but they succeeded in amplifying the fear and tension experienced by Giovanni, Francesca, and the security team. Giovanni immediately suspected that the attempt had been organized by Cosa Nostra. However, the high level of sophistication involved—far beyond anything seen in previous threats—led him to believe that corrupt sectors within the Italian intelligence services might also have played a role. These so-called “deviated services” were long rumored to maintain clandestine ties to organized crime. The Addaura bombing attempt put the strength of the Falcone–Morvillo marriage to the test once again. The couple argued frequently. Giovanni even asked Francesca to end their relationship, convinced that as long as they remained together, the danger to his life would inevitably—and fatally—extend to hers.
The attacks against Giovanni continued, making his work increasingly difficult. That situation ultimately led him to accept an earlier offer from the Minister of Justice: to head the Office of Criminal Affairs at the Ministry of Justice in Rome. In order to move to the capital with Francesca, she also requested a transfer and joined the Examination Commission for Judicial Candidates. In this new role—and under a new lifestyle that seemed to offer fewer risks to his and Francesca’s safety—Giovanni used his executive position to promote two critical initiatives: the creation of the Anti-Mafia Investigation Directorate (Direzione Investigativa Antimafia, DIA) and the National Anti-Mafia Directorate (Direzione Nazionale Antimafia, DNA). The goal of the former was to coordinate the work of anti-mafia prosecutors across the country. The latter aimed to establish an elite task force composed of members from various law enforcement agencies, whose sole mission would be to investigate and dismantle mafia organizations.
Giovanni and Francesca’s relatively peaceful time in Rome came to a sudden halt on August 9, 1991, when Judge Antonino Scopelliti was assassinated. Scopelliti was the magistrate who had supported Giovanni’s legal arguments before the Court of Cassation. At his colleague’s funeral, Giovanni was once again confronted with the deadly consequences of his work and his vocation. He realized that no matter how far he distanced himself from Sicily, Sicily would always be with him. “If they’ve made up their minds, they will never stop. I’m next,” he said. His prediction was accurate. A team of hitmen, led by Matteo Messina Denaro—the so-called Prince of the Mafia—made their way to Rome with the intention of assassinating Giovanni, television host Maurizio Costanzo (who had publicly mocked the mafia), and Justice Minister Claudio Martelli.
Giovanni came under renewed criticism after he pushed for a package of new laws aimed at centralizing anti-mafia investigations, toughening penalties for mafia-related crimes, and granting the government the authority to dissolve municipalities infiltrated by organized crime. Magistrates and politicians opposed to Falcone publicly attacked him once again, accusing him of trying to concentrate anti-mafia power under his sole control through the proposed legislation. Fortunately for Giovanni—and for all those who had lived and died in the pursuit of justice during the Maxiprocesso—the Court of Cassation began reviewing the landmark case on December 9. On January 30, 1992, the judges issued a ruling that upheld the vast majority of the original convictions.
The new and final judicial blow to the leadership of Cosa Nostra brought to light a series of broken promises made to the mafia by certain politicians. The inability to appoint a judge known for overturning mafia convictions on highly technical grounds—Magistrate Corrado Carnevale, nicknamed “the sentence killer”—put the leaders of the Christian Democratic Party in Sicily directly in the mafia’s crosshairs. Rarely has that expression been so literal. On July 12, 1992, two hitmen on a motorcycle ambushed and executed Member of the European Parliament Salvo Lima, shooting him multiple times before running him over. Lima—former mayor of Palermo, national deputy, liaison between Cosa Nostra and Italian Prime Minister Giulio Andreotti, mastermind behind the plundering of Palermo, and possible instigator of the murder of Piersanti Mattarella—became the first victim of the Sicilian mafia for failing to uphold the political deals it had struck.
Giovanni and Francesca’s trips from Rome to Sicily had become quite frequent. Whenever their plane landed, Giovanni’s local security detail would meet him directly on the tarmac. May 23, 1992, was no exception. After a fifty-minute flight, as the plane stopped on the runway at Punta Raisi Airport, the couple was met at the door by their escorts: Giuseppe Costanza, Antonio Montinaro, Vito Schifani, Rocco Dicillo, Paolo Capuzza, Gaspare Cervelló, and Angelo Corbo. Giovanni wanted to drive. He took the wheel of the white Croma, the second car in the motorcade. Francesca sat beside him, and Giuseppe Costanza—who was supposed to be driving that day—was relegated to the back seat. Outside the airport, two members of Cosa Nostra had been watching. They had tracked the security team since leaving Palermo and were now observing the magistrate couple’s arrival. The highway connecting the airport to the Sicilian capital is winding—cutting through mountains in some sections and appearing to end in the Mediterranean in others. The motorcade of three armored cars was discreetly followed by a fourth vehicle, driven by one of the mobsters who had been watching from the airport. Over the phone, he relayed the motorcade’s position as it progressed along the highway. Waiting at the other end were two high-ranking mafia figures—Giovanni Brusca and Antonino Gioè—close associates of boss Salvatore Riina and seasoned enough to coordinate such a complex operation. They were positioned on a hill at the entrance to the town of Capaci, near the junction of the A29 highway heading toward Palermo. At exactly 5:58 p.m., near Capaci, the earth erupted and hell broke loose. The first vehicle in the convoy exploded directly above the buried bomb, landing over 200 meters away in a field of olive and lemon trees near the highway. All its occupants were killed instantly. The second car, driven by Giovanni, crashed head-on into a massive block of concrete that had been launched into the air by the explosion. The third vehicle managed to brake in time, colliding with the second car—but all its passengers survived. The bodyguard and designated driver of the second vehicle—who had been acting solely as an escort that day—managed to exit the car on his own.
Francesca was trapped inside the vehicle and was rescued by a few bystanders who approached the scene. Giovanni, on the other hand, had to wait for the firefighters. His unconscious body, slumped over the steering wheel, was pinned inside the wreckage. After being pulled from the twisted metal, Giovanni and Francesca were transported to two different hospitals. Both were in extremely critical condition, suffering from multiple fractures, contusions, and internal bleeding that severely complicated their chances of survival. Giovanni was admitted to Palermo’s Civic Hospital, where he experienced repeated cardiac arrests and respiratory failures for over an hour. Despite the doctors’ efforts, it became impossible to keep him alive. Giovanni Falcone died at 7:05 p.m. on May 23, 1992, in the hands of his friend and colleague Paolo Borsellino, who had rushed to the scene as soon as he heard of the attack. Francesca, initially taken to Cervelló Hospital and later transferred to the Civic Hospital, drifted in and out of consciousness, repeatedly asking, “Where is Giovanni? Where is Giovanni?” Her numerous internal injuries ultimately led to her death shortly after 10:00 p.m. The Capaci massacre came to its tragic conclusion four hours after it began.
Two days later, a joint funeral for all the victims was held at the Church of San Domenico on Via Roma in the city of Palermo: Giovanni, Francesca, Vito, Rocco, and Antonio were honored in a state funeral. On that May 25, 1992, a large crowd of Sicilians gathered around the church to pay tribute and bid farewell to the heroes of the State—their heroes. But instead, they found themselves face to face with the very officials who had criticized, slandered, and abandoned Giovanni in his fight against the mafia. Upon noticing the presence of these politicians, the crowd quickly reacted—attacking them and forcing them to flee, narrowly escaping being lynched. Every year, on May 23, a long series of commemorative events takes place across Italy, the United States, and several other parts of the world to honor the life and legacy of Judge Giovanni Falcone, Judge Francesca Morvillo, and police officers Vito Schifani, Rocco Dicillo, and Antonio Montinaro. For many, Giovanni Falcone and all the other victims became immortal—not as superheroes, but as true heroes who dared to stand up to the mafia. But Giovanni was more than a hero who knew how to confront fear—he was a scientist of justice.
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