NASHVILLE, Tenn.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Aug 29, 2023--

A notorious Italian mafia boss has died while receiving medical treatment after being arrested early this year, according to media reports. Matteo Messina Denaro was known as the last “godfather” of the Cosa Nostra or the Sicilian mafia. He was arrested in January after being on the run since 1993 and was suffering from colon cancer at the time of his arrest. He is believed to have ordered dozens of Mafia-related murders for the Cosa Nostra. Messina Denaro’s condition worsened in recent weeks and he was transferred to the San Salvatore hospital in L’Aquila from a maximum-security prison in central Italy. He had requested no aggressive medical treatment, Italian news agency ANSA reported on Monday. The medics had stopped feeding him after he was declared to be in an irreversible coma. A fugitive for the past 30 years, Messina Denaro was arrested at a private hospital in the Sicilian capital of Palermo, where he had been receiving treatment for cancer under a false name. He was sentenced in absentia to a life term for his role in the 1992 murders of anti-mafia prosecutors Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino. He also faced a life sentence for his role in bomb attacks in Florence, Rome and Milan which killed 10 people the following year. Messina Denaro was accused of helping organise the kidnapping of a 12-year-old, Giuseppe Di Matteo, to try to dissuade the boy’s father from giving evidence against the mafia as well. The boy was held for two years, then murdered. Nicknamed “Diabolik”, he was once considered a candidate to be the Sicilian mafia’s “boss of bosses”, after the deaths of Bernardo Provenzano in 2016 and Salvatore “Toto” Riina in 2017. According to medical records leaked to the Italian media, he underwent surgery for colon cancer in 2020 and 2022 under the false name “Andrea Buonafede”. A doctor at the Palermo clinic told the La Repubblica newspaper that Messina Denaro’s health had worsened significantly in the months leading up to his capture. Messina Denaro, who had a power base in the Sicilian port city of Trapani, in western Sicily, was considered Sicily’s Cosa Nostra top boss even while he was a fugitive. Police said in September 2022 that he was still able to issue commands relating to the way the mafia was run in the area around Trapani, his regional stronghold, despite his long disappearance. The son of a mafioso, Messina Denaro was born in the southwestern Sicilian town of Castelvetrano in 1962. He followed his father into the mob and was already carrying a gun at 15 years of age. Police said he carried out his first killing when he was 18. The Castelvetrano clan was allied to the Corleonesi, led by Salvatore “The Beast” Riina, who became the undisputed “boss of bosses” of the Sicilian mob, thanks to his ruthless pursuit of power. Nicknamed “U Siccu” (The Skinny One), Messina Denaro became his protege and showed he could be just as pitiless as his master, picking up 20 life prison terms in trials held in absentia for his role in an array of mob murders. He himself once claimed to have murdered enough people to fill a cemetery. He went into hiding in 1993 as a growing number of turncoats started providing details of his role in the mob, but investigators believe he rarely wandered far from Sicily. Police said he spent much of 2022 hiding in Campobello di Mazara, a town of about 11,000, a short drive from his mother’s house in western Sicily. He communicated with other mafiosi via “pizzini”, small pieces of paper, sometimes written in code and distributed by messengers, some of which were intercepted by police. He never married, but was known to have had a number of lovers. He wrote he had a daughter, but had never met her. Despite his notoriety, prosecutors have always doubted Messina Denaro became the Mafia “boss of bosses”, saying it was more likely that he was simply the head of Cosa Nostra in western Sicily. Additional reporting by agencies Read More Matteo Messina Denaro: The last ‘godfather’ of the Cosa Nostra arrested after 30 years on the run Watch moment Italy’s most infamous mafia boss Matteo Messina Denaro is arrested Italian police announce arrest of most-wanted mafia boss Matteo Messina Denaro Pope blames weapons industry for Russia-Ukraine war and 'martyrdom' of Ukrainian people Giorgio Napolitano, former Italian president, 1st ex-Communist in that post, has died, at 98 Sabato De Sarno makes much anticipated debut at Gucci under the gaze of stars like Julia Roberts

Elon Musk has left his Twitter followers stumped with a bizarre comparison of Taylor Swift and Napoleon Dynamite. You'd think the tech mogul would have bigger things on his mind, but on Friday, it seemingly wandered elsewhere. Musk tweeted a picture of Swift and the awkward teen character, asking: "How do we know for sure they’re different people?" The caption above the photo collage of the two read: "When you realise Taylor Swift is actually Napoleon Dynamite." The tweet soon went viral across Twitter, with many flocking to the responses. "As both a Musk fan and a Taylor Swift fan, this is not the crossover I wanted," one person hit back, while another added: "Someone come get the owner of Twitter's phone, please. Now I can’t unsee it." Meanwhile, one person had enough and brutally wrote: "Elon pls go tend to ur baby DU-139X# before even coming on this shi**y app you wasted money on." Sign up for our free Indy100 weekly newsletter Now, this isn't the first time Musk has turned his attention to the 'Shake It Off' singer. In March, the Tesla founder complimented the star by saying her "limbic resonance skill is exceptional." Everyone was just as confused as each other, but it apparently means "a state of deep emotional and physiological connection between two people. The limbic system in the brain is the seat of emotions." He didn't stop there either. Under a series of photos from Swift's hotly-anticipated Eras Tour, Musk responded with a cigarette emoji which most people interpreted as him calling the singer smoking. When one Twitter user asked whether Musk and Swift would make a cute couple, he simply responded with a crying laughing face. Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

Rebecca Adlington said she is “truly heartbroken” after suffering a late-stage miscarriage. The double Olympic gold medal swimmer found out about the devastating loss at a routine 20-week scan, sharing the news in a post on Instagram yesterday evening. “I don’t really have the words right now but unfortunately we went for our 20 week scan this week and they found no heartbeat. I gave birth to our angel, Harper on Friday at 7pm. We held her, and had time with her. We will forever love her and remember her always,” Adlington, 34, said. After thanking staff at Wythenshawe Hospital for their “kindness and care”, she added: “I don’t have the strength or words right now and don’t feel ready to share this news. However, I can’t pretend to be ok or fake a smile. I can’t have people ask me how pregnancy is or when I am due as I still look pregnant. I don’t have the strength to tell this news individually. “We are so truly heartbroken. Our beautiful girl. Rest in peace.” Adlington – who shares son Albie, two, with her husband Andy Parsons and has an eight-year-old daughter, Summer, from her previous marriage with Harry Needs – previously revealed she’d had a miscarriage 12 weeks into her pregnancy last August, resulting in emergency surgery. And as her Instagram post this week highlights, one of the many difficult things about losing a baby is telling other people. So, how can people respond supportively when a friend, relative or colleague shares news of a baby loss? Showing empathy “It’s about showing empathy as much as you possibly can, showing some form of understanding, and really just being there to listen to them,” Rochelle Love, a midwife working with baby loss charity Tommy’s, told the PA news agency. A late miscarriage is one which happens between 14-24 weeks of pregnancy, and is less common than early-stage miscarriage, occurring in an estimated 1-2% of pregnancies, Love explained. “We don’t always know why these miscarriages happen. They can be for a multitude of reasons, and the sad thing for expectant parents is that we may not always find a definite cause,” she added. “It may not necessarily be related to previous miscarriage.” Take care with ‘helpful’ comments Friends and family may try to comfort someone who’s lost a baby with well-meaning but sometimes way off-the-mark ‘helpful’ comments. Love said it’s crucial to be very careful about what you say. “I don’t think it’s ever up to us to make assumptions, and especially do not make comments like: ‘Don’t worry, you can have another baby’, ‘Don’t worry, you can try again’, or, ‘You were only 20 weeks pregnant’,” Love advised. “I think sometimes people just don’t know what else to say, so they make these throwaway comments, which are not necessarily the best things to say when someone’s grieving. It’s not up to us to say [these things] – how do you know, for example, that they can have another baby? Think about what you’re going to say before you speak to someone who’s had a loss.” Be mindful of terminology Remember this isn’t just a foetus to the grieving parents – it’s their child, and it can be very important to talk about it as such. Love said: “Address the baby as their baby, and if the baby has a name, then use it. Be very careful of the words you use.” Be there for them Instead of offering up platitudes, Love said it’s often better to just let people know you’re there if they need you. “Just let them know you’re there for them – you’re there if they want to speak, or if they just want to sit in silence – you’re available to be their support if and when they should need it,” she explained. Don’t forget their partner Love stresses that any kind of support needs to be extended to the partner as well. “Sometimes the partner is ignored and we just focus on the pregnant person, but the partner is the pregnant person’s closest support and they’ve also lost their baby and are also grieving,” she said. “I always advise anyone who’s had an unfortunate loss that if they decide to go for grief counselling, they should make their partner a part of that process as well, so they can go on that grief and healing journey together.” Remember everyone will grieve differently Loss and grief is experienced differently by everyone. “How I may grieve a pregnancy loss may be very different from how somebody else might grieve,” said Love – so it’s important to let people do things their way and at their own pace. Think about offering them helpIf you are close with them, offer practical help if you feel they may welcome it. Love said this could mean “getting someone’s groceries for them because they don’t feel they can face getting dressed and going out, or cleaning the house – anything at all could be very well received.” Tommy’s helpline is on 0800 014 7800 Read More What you need to know about new research into treating cervical cancer How to do Halloween make up and still take care of your skin Which houseplants best suit your star sign? 5 of the hottest new perfume launches for autumn/winter Consistent lack of sleep may increase risk of future depressive symptoms – study World Osteoporosis Day: The risk factors and early warning signs everyone needs to know about

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BELMONT, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Aug 7, 2023--