If Silvana Did It, So Can I

Susan notes: This story from AWR fan Gaby Feile features Silvana Fucito. The information is from 2005 and 2009. I’ve tried to find updates on her story without any luck... Anyone have any more information on this fight for justice?

Silvana Fucito is a towering example of how to stand up to the brutal crime syndicate that terrorizes Naples. The Neapolitan mob, the Camorra, picked on the wrong lady when it began demanding that Fucito and her husband, Gennaro Petrucci, cough up the notorious extortion payments known as the pizzo (from the Italian word for goatee, describing those who dip their beards in their neighbors’ soup) at the family paint store four years ago.

Like many, the couple first tried shooing the thugs away with excuses, free cans of paint and an occasional small “loan” that would never get repaid. But then in 2002, a pair of Camorra came into the store in the city’s rough San Giovanni neighborhood with a check to cash—for €100,000. One of the men flashed a pistol.

Petrucci did his best, amid escalating threats, to try to convince the Camorra bosses that the couple didn’t have that kind of money. Then one day, Fucito decided that she would come out from behind the counter to confront the unwelcome guests. “When I stepped out—a woman—and told them to leave, they couldn’t unload on me,” she recalls. “They couldn’t threaten me. That must have made them even more angry.”

Click here for the full story:
Time.com
Photo Credit:
Time.com

Related Links:
Silvana Fucito – Wikipedia (Italian)