CAMORRA TRIAL.

Dominion, Volume 5, Issue 1467, 15 June 1912, Page 5

CAMORRA TRIAL.

COUNSEL TOO TALKATIVE,

PRISONERS RESENT A THREE WEEKS , SPEECH.

AFRAID THEY WILL DIE IN GAOL,

By Teleeraph—Press Assooiation-CoDyrieht Rome, June 13. Tho Camorra trial, which has been in progress at " Viterbo for over fifteen months, has come to a temporary halt. Siguor Lioy, one of the numerous counsel who arc- defending tho thirty odd prisoners, had been addressing tho Court for three wcck3 continuously, when the prisoners complained, and declare that unless the speech is curtailed four of them, sufforing from heart disease, will die in gaol.

Signor Lioy, incensed at the prisoners' ingratitude, doffed his gown and quitted the court. ' Tho trial has been postponed, and the Judge is striving'to persuade Signor Lioy 'to resume his speech. EXTRAORDINARY PROCEEDINGS. VERDICT "STILL FAR OFF." Ono of these days, no doubt (wrote a correspondent of the "Westminster Gazette" oil March 5 last), the Camorra trial will be finished, It has now been in progress exactly a year. When tho trial was opened at Vitorbo, some said it would last six months, others thought it might last a year, and still more doubtful folk predicted as long a sitting as that of the Conclave which elected Pope Gregory the Tenth and plunged Viterbo into turmoil and bloodshed for nearly three years. Anyhow, several of the prisoners were released tho other day for tho simple reason that they had already undergonelive years' incarceration, and thus satisfied tho maximum sentence that could bo passed npon them! The crime which led to the arrest of the Camorrists took place nearly six years ago, when the body of Gennaro Cuocolo, bearing the marks of thirty-nino stabwounds, was discovered on the eeashore near Torre del Greco, and when tho body of his wife, stabbed in fourteen places, was found at the Cuocolos' house, in the Via Nardones. Neither of these indivi-. duals were of great repute, but murder is. murder, and the Neapolitan police soon declared the orime to bo of Camorrist origin. The Chief Figure, /

The chiof figure among the prisoners Was one Enrico—or Erricone —Alfano, who had denounced tho Cuocolos for treaohery. As for Gennaro Cuocolo, he had declared himself a reformed liver who, as the result of the intervention of Saint Gennaro to cure him from grievous illness, had married, and settled down — "tranquil and home-loving, and only compromised once when in pnblio ho boxed the ears of Enrico Alfano." Erricono had been head of the Camorra from 1893 to 1905, entering office at the age of twenty, and relinquishing it in order to be less in tho eyes of the police.

Tho leaders were brought to book—and tho magistrate liberated them! And the , cause which led to their liberation was the appearance of the most picturesque of all the actors in this Camorra cometly, farce, drama—or whatever it is. Father Vitozzi, Erricone's godfather, called by some the Grand Chaplain, by others tho Pope, of tho Camorra; referred to by the Crown Prosecutor in the trial as "that unworthy ecclesiastic." Vitozzi swore "in his sacerdotal character and before tho holy crucifix" that the men were innocent, The names of the real murderers had been given him wider the seal of the confessional, he said, but— these were not tho men. And so they got their liberty. . ■" ; ■ ■■/ At tho beginning of 11)07, however, the arresta began all over again, nnd on a grander scale. Many fled from Naples, and remained free for a time, while Erricone had' to be brought back from America. But arrested they were, and flung into prison, forty-two of them; fivo (in. cludiuz Erriconfi) charged with instigate ing, and sis with committing the double murder. Time'To Do Something. Then there was another pause. The trial was postponed again and again. Ciro, Erricone's younger brother, died in prison oE heart disease. Vitozzi, in the spring of 1910, was said to bo at tho point of death, after two strokes of apoplexy. It really seemed about time to do something. •' Tho trial (continues the "Westminster Gazette" writer) b'ejran a year ago today. There were thirty-six prisoners and upwards of'six hundred witnesses, the latter being about equally divided—for and against! The proceedings were hold—the trial has now been removed to Naples— in the whitewashed Church of the Scalzi.

For the prisoners two cages, tremendously massive things, had been built in tho north transept, over the tomb of Lorenso da Viterbo, the painter. There was a big cage for the bulk of the prisoners and a small cage for Abbatemagio, who had enlivened things by turning informer. (Somo angry glances have been thrown at that smaller cage as the trial has proceeded—or appeared to proceed.) Father Vitozzi, in honour, of his cloth, was permitted to sit outside tho cage.

A good deal was heard of the trial in its earlier stages, but tho press reports became' less and less voluminous, until they finally ceased altogether. A month or two rufo the Crown Prosecutor expressed the opinion that the verdict "is still far oft'." ' .