Cicero tells about Montante’s friendships with the VIPs of the Armed Forces

Antonello Montante would have had friendly relations with law enforcement officers that went far beyond the institutional ones. This is what Alfonso Cicero, former commissioner of Irsap (the regional Institute for the development of productive activities) said, called today to testify in the bunker hall of Caltanissetta as part of the trial on the “Rising System” which is celebrated with rite ordinary against 17 defendants.

«Once Marco Venturi (former regional councilor for productive activities, ed) told me – Cicero says – that he had witnessed an episode during a dinner: Colonel Giuseppe D’Agata had given Antonello Montante a pen drive. He was impressed, because such a prominent member of law enforcement delivering a pen drive in that context was anomalous. As for Colonel Letterio Romeo, I knew he was a police officer. I met him for the first time in 2013 in a pizzeria in Piazza Mercato. Montante had invited me for a pizza and when I arrived he was already sitting with Romeo. I immediately realized that there was a relationship of intimate friendship between them. Then I didn’t see Romeo anymore, except on the occasion of a funeral, when we went to have a coffee and I saw that Colonel Romeo also had very close friendships with the entrepreneur Massimo Romano ».

Still with regard to the relations of the former leader of Confindustria with the officers of the law enforcement agencies, in turn accused, Cicero added: “Colonel Gianfranco Ardizzone confided to me that his transfer from the Dia di Reggio Calabria to that of Caltanissetta was occurred thanks to the interest of Montante. While of the major Ettore Orfanello, also Marco Venturi, he confided to me that the partner had been hired by Massimo Romano in one of his supermarkets ».

Then there is the Nicolo Marino chapter. Nicolò Marino, currently Gip in Rome and former regional councilor in Sicily during the Crocetta junta, with responsibility for Water, Waste and Energy, was to be done outside the regional government. Alfonso Cicero, former president of IRSAP, said this in the hearing at the trial on the “Rising System” which is held with an ordinary rite in Caltanissetta.
“The entrepreneur Giuseppe Catanzaro, a leading exponent of Confindustria – says Cicero, answering the questions of the prosecutor Maurizio Bonaccorso – told me that Montante was doing everything to publish a dossier concerning the private life of Nicolò Marino, on scandalous facts . Linda Vancheri (former regional councilor) also told me, explaining that Montante had entrusted this dossier to the lawyer Antonio Fiumefreddo of Catania to have it published on an online site or a blog. Montante had great esteem for this criminal lawyer ».

«There was another episode: in February 2014 a conference organized by the national Confindustria was held in a company in the industrial area of ​​Ragusa. On the sidelines of the conference I realized that there were Montante, Catanzaro and Crocetta who had stood aside. From the way he gesticulated and from the way he addressed him it was clear that Montante was scolding Crocetta. Catanzaro said nothing and witnessed this scene. When Marino was kicked out of the government, precisely because of the battles he was waging on transparency in waste management, Catanzaro told me that in that conference Montante gave an ultimatum to Crocetta: “Either you chase him away or he no longer has to challenge the management of Catanzaro” . Then Marino was chased away ».