Scomparsi

This work looks back at the group’s hundreds of kidnapping operations by southern Italy’s ‘Ndrangheta crime syndicate, one of the most powerful in the world, and focuses on the stories of 8 missing persons who were never found.

Between 1969 and 1998, Italy recorded 649 kidnappings—a near mass phenomenon, quickly forgotten or perhaps deliberately buried in silence. That’s an average of 22 people abducted every year, for nearly three decades. In Calabria alone, there were 128 cases, 117 of them in the province of Reggio. Men, women, even children were held hostage—sometimes for years. Human beings promised freedom in exchange for money. Ransoms that fed the growth of criminal economies, financing the mafia’s leap into drug trafficking, vehicles, and construction equipment for the corrupt earthmoving industry.

During this dark chapter, the 'Ndrangheta—and organizations tied to Calabrian clans—played a dominant role. While kidnappings occurred throughout Italy, many were managed from the Aspromonte mountains. At least one-third of these abductions bear the mark of criminal groups from Reggio Calabria, particularly the powerful clans operating in the triangle of San Luca, Natile, and Platì.

According to conservative estimates, more than 400 billion lire were paid in ransom over the years. This illicit economy involved entire mountain communities. Managing a kidnapping required an extensive network of complicity: abductors, negotiators, jailers, and lookouts. Some operations involved up to 30 people, while hundreds of others remained silent accomplices.

Not all victims returned home. Of the 128 kidnapped in Calabria, eight vanished without a trace—swallowed by the mountains, hastily buried to erase any evidence. The remains of Vincenzo Macrì, Mariangela Passiatore, Giuseppe Gullì, Antonio Colistra, Giuseppe Bertolami, Alfredo Sorbara, Vincenzo Medici, and Pasquale Malgeri have never been found. The details surrounding their disappearances remain unknown to investigators. Many theories have been explored over the years, but only a few terrible truths have surfaced.

The same fate could have fallen upon Adolfo Cartisano. His body was recovered ten years after his abduction, thanks to an anonymous letter from one of his jailers who revealed the location of his burial site.

This work tells their stories.