Rosario Naimo
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Rosario Naimo (born August 18, 1945 in Palermo) is a member of the Sicilian Mafia, also known as Saro or Saruzzo. He was seen as an important go-between for the Sicilian and American Mafia, closely related with the Gambino crime family. He is a man of honour from the Tommaso Natale-Cardillo Mafia family that later became part of San Lorenzo family.[1]
He became a member of the Mafia in Sicily in 1965 and immigrated to Detroit in the United States in 1968.[2] According to a 2006 report of the New Jersey State Commission of Investigation, Naimo was the head of the Sicilian Mafia in the United States at the time. He succeeded Francesco Gambino, convicted for his role in running the "Iron Tower" conspiracy – a drug trafficking and money laundering operation.[3] He was a man so powerful that the Sicilian Mafia boss of bosses Salvatore Riina said of him that he was "more powerful than the President of the United States".[4]
Guaranteeing Mafia peace
Naimo is related to the expulsion of the Inzerillo clan by the Corleonesi after the Second Mafia War in the years 1981-1983. Riina had the Sicilian Mafia Commission to adopt a ruling that allowed the surviving Inzerillos to take refuge in the U.S., with the agreement that none of them, or their offspring, could ever return to Sicily.[5] Many went to the New York area and joined forces with their relatives in the Gambino crime family. They were dubbed "gli scappati" (the escapees).[6] However, after the arrest of Totò Riina (1993) and other hard-line Corleonesi like Leoluca Bagarella (1995), the Inzerillos started to come back to Sicily. At the time, Naimo had been appointed to guarantee the agreement.[7]