Roberto Manganiello – on the run since 2013 and listed as one of Italy’s 100 most dangerous criminals – is detained while watching football game

This article is more than 4 years old

This article is more than 4 years old

A mafia boss in southern Italy has been arrested by detectives disguised as pizza boys who delivered food to his home as he was watching a football match.



Roberto Manganiello, 35, a major player in Naples’ notorious Camorra mafia, had been on the run since 2013.

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He was listed as “one of Italy’s 100 most dangerous criminals” for an alleged double homicide in 2004 that sparked a bloody gang war in Naples.

Manganiello was arrested on Saturday evening as he watched Napoli play Inter Milan, when the fake delivery boys knocked on his door at an apartment in Orta di Atella, about 15km north of Naples, where police say he runs a drugs and extortion business.

A 30-year-old Neapolitan woman was arrested with him. Manganiello offered no resistance to the police, they said.

Interior minister Angelino Alfano hailed the arrest, describing it as a “success due to top-level investigative work”.