Last words of Matteo Messina Denaro: From life as a fugitive to the attack that killed Giovanni Falcone

From his life as an undisturbed fugitive to the attack that cost the life of Giovanni Falcone. Here is what Matteo Messina Denaro said to the magistrates two months before his death: 'I am not interested, then in life never say never mind. I have never been an absolutist in the sense that it is not that because I say something it will always be that, I have changed my mind many times in my life, but with solid foundations...'. It is July 7, 2023 and Matteo Messina Denaro, aware that he is at the end of his life, opens a gap and responds in this way to the deputy prosecutor of Palermo Paolo Guido who invites him to contribute 'to reconstruct pieces of truth'. The minutes were filed today at the preliminary hearing against the boss's historic lover, Laura Bonafede. Giovanni Falcone 'But there are things, however, that, for example, no one has ever arrived, because it seems a bit reductive to me to say that Falcone was killed because of the sentence of the maxi trial. If then you are happy with this, well come, they are your facts, but the starting base is not this...'. The boss Messina Denaro insinuated truths still to be discovered about the Capaci massacre. 'What I am saying is truth... everyone then, in life... all these, let's call them repentant, who said... they said, yes, some piece of truth, they made them go through trials, okay; but everyone has brought water to his mill then. Then, if to bring water to his mill, they say things that can also coincide with what you are looking for or with what interests you, well come, right? ', he continues. 'You are satisfied that Judge Falcone was killed, because he gave 11 life sentences? Because of 11/12 life sentences it was, in the maxi trial, I believe, but I believe that these are...', he insists insinuating complex motives that then, however, he does not explain. Messina Denaro defines the Capaci attack as the 'most important thing, the one from which everything is born, the massacres, the input'. And with an accusatory manner, alluding to the misdirection of the investigations on the attack that cost the life of Judge Paolo Borsellino, he continues: 'Why did you stop at La Barbera, La Barbera was at the peak of something', referring to the former policeman believed to be the mind of the pollution of the investigation that led to the conviction of innocents. 'If he were alive would you have arrived or would you have stopped a step before?', he asks the prosecutors. Free 'What life did I lead in Palermo? Free like that of Campobello, because for better or worse you have scanned that of Campobello (the town where he spent most of the hiding ndr), but in general I always do that life, that is the same facsimile'. 'My friendships are not that they start and end only in the world that you consider mafia, it is not so, my friendships were everywhere', he added. The mafia boss also told of having tattoos made in the center of the capital between 2006 and 2009 and of having been treated periodically by a dentist. 'I have never distinguished between rich and poor, - he continued - obviously if I had to frequent a poor person I did not go with the Rolex for a form of education, if instead I was for my own affairs with people like me I had no problems, that is I did not have that form of clouding (boasting ndr), I did not want to prove anything'. The family 'I have a ruined family... but in the end what fault did I have? I can have personal faults: hang me, give me all the life sentences you want; but that my family has been paying for a lifetime this type of relationship with me, because I have a sister or I have a brother...'. 'I only know one thing - he adds - but I'm not making any accusation, what... that you have destroyed a family, razed to the ground, there are systems that do not go, let's leave the convictions, there are systems that do not go; now I hear say: destroyed houses... why is my mother: fugitive or mafia? Her...the law, the State has destroyed her house, the furniture made into little pieces. Where do you want to find a dialogue, when there are these behaviors?', he says to the magistrates showing an evident resentment.