With a warrant for his arrest dropped and a new passport in his back pocket, alleged Cosa Nostra financier Vito Palazzolo seems set to return to his homeland.
This week Italian prosecutors from the Palermo jurisdiction began hearing evidence in Cape Town as a last-ditch attempt to prosecute him, but even this attempt appears doomed as key witnesses will not be appearing in court.
A warrant for Palazollo’s arrest on Mafia-related charges was set aside in an Italian court several months ago. This effectively means Palazzolo is now free to come and go in Italy unless he is convicted on a number of charges, including a count of hosting fugitive Mafiosi Giovanni Bonomo and Guiseppe Gelardi at his Franschhoek farm in mid-1996.
With no restrictions on him, Palazzolo again became eligible for an Italian passport, a consular official confirmed, and has applied for and already received one.
Over the past 10 years Palazzolo, who became a South African citizen in 1994, has successfully fought numerous extradition requests from Italian judicial authorities, including one related to the American Pizza Connection case centred on drug distribution in the United States and money laundering through Swiss and other bank accounts. During a 36-hour Christmas release from prison in Switzerland in 1986 he made his way to South Africa, and later the then Ciskei homeland.
Meanwhile, South African authorities have failed in their attempts to convict him on counts ranging from immigration violations to international money laundering. In 2001 South African investigators had to return documentation and computer data seized from various Liechtenstein companies linked to Palazzolo after his legal team successfully challenged an international legal cooperation agreement between South Africa and Italy granted in Vaduz, Liechtenstein.
A similar international cooperation request has brought the Italian criminal tribunal, both judges and prosecutors, under the watchful eyes of bodyguards, to Cape Town. But the hearing under South Africa’s International Cooperation in Criminal Matters Act has been bedevilled with complications.
While noseweek editor Martin Welz took the stand — ”I don’t mind testifying on what it published. [Palazzolo] is a man we don’t need in South Africa,” he later said outside court — SABC investigative journalist Jacques Pauw turned to the Pretoria Magistrate’s Court to have his subpoena to testify about an October 1998 Special Assignment programme set aside.
This application, the Italians were apparently told, could take months to be finalised. Other witnesses have also fallen by the wayside following discussions with justice officials in Pretoria. They include the state’s special prosecutor, advocate Bruce Morrison, former National Director of Public Prosecutions, Bulelani Ngcuka and ex-Interpol head in South Africa, Dave Bruce.
However, former Transvaal attorney-general, now advocate, Klaus von Lieres und Wilkau, and retired Western Cape police assistant commissioner Leonard Knipe, who formed a private investigating company with ex-national police Commissioner George Fivaz, will testify.
Not appearing is Palazzolo himself who as an accused can only be called last under Italian law. But proceedings in the Cape Town Magistrate’s Court, postponed from March, will form an integral part of his current trial in absentia in Palermo. And the cross-examination of witnesses has often been very robust.
The issue of how far cross-examination could go was indicative of ”the problematic nature of what we are doing”, magistrate Derek Winter said at one point. ”Possibly this is why the Act we are dealing with should be revisited. Perhaps there should be an amendment.”
His suggestion came after temperatures rose over police investigator Piet Viljoen’s claim that Palazzolo was protected in South Africa. ”With Palazzolo’s contacts there will not be a successful prosecution,” he said, but admitted later: ”There’s no dark conspiracy. There are a few people in the right places who can influence people. They may be misinformed about Palazzolo’s background.”
Palazzolo’s advocate Jan Heunis said that despite some R5,5-million spent on investigating him, ”Palazzolo is a free man in this country … with no convictions against him and no charges against him.”
On Thursday morning it emerged that Palazzolo is suing Viljoen and his former colleague Abraham Smith for at least R5-million for defamation over their statements against him in the October 1998 Special Assignment programme.
The civil matter is pending before the Cape High Court.