Killing is tiredautobiography of a murderer premiered in Venice and on 17 June on first TV on Sky cinema 1, it is a film by Daniele Vicari produced by Mompracem with Rai Cinema freely based on the memoir of the same name released in 1992 by Antonio Zagari who went down in history as the first “pentito”, quotation marks obligatory, more precisely as the first collaborator of justice of the ‘ndrangheta in Lombardy.
It will be Antonio himself, born in 1954 and raised in the Varese area where his father Giacomo had arrived in the early fifties, at the trial known as Isola Felice, celebrated in Varese between 1995 and 1997, to tell, in a deposition in the courtroom which was also noted for the property of language and the subjunctives in an unusual order at the time in that kind of criminal context, that he found himself in fact part of the criminal organization by “right” at birth as tradition in ‘Ndrangheta familiesbut to have then been formally affiliated at 16 years old.
THE CRIMINAL CURRICULUM
At 19, Antonio Zagari ends up in prison for the first time for a matter of smuggling counterfeit banknotes between Italy and Switzerland. It is the beginning of a criminal curriculum that will lead him to robberies, extortions, and in the end to admit at least 16 murders, the first of which in 1979 for a score-settling against a Sicilian guilty of having “trespassed” into the control of the territory.
In the early 1980s, his paternity of attempted and successful murders attracted testimonies from escaped victims and sidelong glances from relatives of “fallen” victims: in 1983, arrested for the umpteenth time, he was convinced to collaborate. It is not easy to say, it is never easy to say in these cases, how much the disgust for the blood shed which he also spoke about had an impact and how much the fact of feeling hunted, because other mafiosi had circulated his name. It is an uncertain first collaboration that ends in evasion and inaction. In 1985, after being arrested again, he now has a cumulative 30 years in first and second degree behind him, except that an error in the Supreme Court leads to his release due to expiry of the terms.
But that attempt at collaboration has now made him unreliable even for the blood and ‘ndrangheta family that coincide in the ‘ndrine. The wife asks for separation, the father considers him a “cuckold”.
THE KIDNAPPING FOILED
Hunted on all sides and no longer in control of his own life, Antonio Zagari says he is also dealing with a crime he has never digested: the kidnapping of Emanuele Riboli, a boy he knew who lived near him, kidnapped by Anonymous and never returned home. A round of kidnappings into which the Zagari family was involved and against which Antonio Zagari agrees to expose himself by playing a double game, on the one hand he is subjected to pressure from his father and does not stop committing score-settling, probably also trying to re-credit his own credibility, but in the meantime he informs Gianpaolo Ganzer, a young colonel of the Carabinieri: this is how in 1990 the kidnapping of Antonella Dallea, daughter of an entrepreneur in Germignaga on Lake Maggiore, was foiled at the last minute.
In July 1990 Antonio Zagari risks falling victim to a score-settling, he saves himself by shooting the two who came to pick him up who probably suspect his betrayal, managing to kill only one of them.
THE ‘NDRINE REVEALED, THE MEMORY OF SPATARO
Antonio Zagari was arrested the same day. His collaboration, rare in the ‘Ndrangheta because it means betraying not only the mandate bond but the family bond, in this case the father, collected by the deputy prosecutor of the newly formed DDA of Milan Armando Spataro will lead between 1995 and 1997 to the first of the trials referred to in the news as “Happy Island”.
Spataro himself, who still remembers, after more than thirty years, Zagari’s long collaboration, precise not only in grammar but also in verifiable and confirmed details, has reconstructed the context of those years on several occasions: «Antonio Zagari», we read in the book It was worth itLaterza 2010, «Saverio Morabito and other important collaborators also revealed in detail the rules and hierarchies of the ‘ndrangheta, thus allowing us to penetrate a world that until then seemed inaccessible».
In a report entitled Mafia crime in Lombardy, the State’s response, the Society’s response, communicated at the conference “Education to legality in the context of educational prevention” in early December 1995 in Milan, he explained the mechanisms of the ‘Ndrangheta in the North and its trafficking at the time, explaining how the penetration of organized crime had «also been facilitated by the institution of compulsory residence, although not in terms of decisiveness, as too often we tend to believe. In any case, the “golden triangle” of Lombardy, which attracts criminals of all types – and, above all, those with a high level of criminality – is certainly that of Milan-Como-Varese, a true breeding ground for mafia expansion throughout Northern Italy. It is no coincidence, in fact, that between the mid-1970s and the mid-1990s, these provinces were the ones most marked by the plague of kidnappings.”
FROM BERGAMOT Smuggling TO MURDERS
With trades that have followed this evolution pattern: «from the initial smuggling of cigarettes and bergamot (a precious essence for perfumes ed.) to robberies, from extortion to kidnappings, from arms trafficking to narcotics trafficking (trafficking, the latter, which made its forceful appearance around the beginning of the 80s, to later become the main illicit activity of any organized criminal group), all characterized by the practice of murders, a primary tool for resolving conflicts and suppressing rivals”. Suffice it to say that 1991 is the year in which Italy recorded the peak of homicides, over 1,900 compared to around 350 currently.
A STORY FROM THE INSIDE
Enzo Ciconte, professor of Mafia History at the University of Pavia and at the Santa Caterina College, one of the leading experts on organized crime, especially in Calabria, tells an anecdote about Zagari: «There is a rumor that the father, an important ringleader, had placed a gun and a key in the cradle of his newborn son, as was customary.‘ndrangheta legend had it that if the little boy had touched the key first he would have become a cop, if he had touched the gun first he would have become a good ‘ndrangheta player. Since the latter is the fate considered natural for the children of affiliated families, it seems that the father made it appear that the child had touched the gun first, but popular belief is that it happened differently. And given how it ended, with the son collaborating and having his father arrested, perhaps they also lied to themselves… Much more seriously, Zagari’s collaboration was important because he did not report by hearsay, but by participating, he had direct knowledge of the facts, he could say detailed things that he had committed or that he had heard reported at home by those who had committed them”.
CICONTE: MAFIAS IN THE NORTH, A LONG UNDERESTIMATION
Even if it then took many years, until 2015 with the Crimine -Infinito sentences between Milan and Reggio Calabria, to see the ‘Ndrangheta become res judicata recognized by the Supreme Court as a top-down and unitary structure, with a relationship between Lombardy and the parent company as between holding and subsidiaries: «The serious thing however», observes Ciconte, «is that in 2026 the CSM still does not recognize those of Piedmont, Lombardy, Emilia as judicial districts with high mafia density – the reference is a resolution of June 2026 – as if that long underestimation that prevented us from accepting the idea that the mafia existed in the North was still among us despite the fact that many definitive sentences have repeatedly established its roots».
SHOUDY DEALINGS, KIDNAPPINGS AND EXTORTION
Shortly thereafter, compared to Zagara’s testimonies, the very odious business of kidnappings would have dried up also thanks to to the 1991 law that blocked family assets, preventing the payment of ransoms: «The seizures»explains Ciconte, «were used to accumulate capital to then invest in construction and drug trafficking, which made people earn more while risking less. Another big deal was the extortion of entrepreneurs, which Zagari contributed to shedding light on, because it did not emerge as it was not reported. It worked like this: Zagari’s father had one of his young men call the company that was to be subjected to extortion and ask for money. The victims became scared and instead of calling the police, they called Giacomo Zagari, whose fame was known in the Varese area. He went to the company and pretended to receive the extortion phone calls and to reduce the initial demand, negotiating a lower amount, giving the entrepreneur the idea of having saved, but it was an act. As for seizures, the law on the freezing of assets was important in eradicating them, but it is true that in the early nineties they were already reducing because once the ‘ndrina had obtained the money from the seizures, it tended to turn to drug trafficking, which was more profitable and less risky”.
And with the advantage of attracting much less attention and disapproval from public opinion.
HOW IT ENDED
Antonio Zagari, who entered a strict protection program, was lost until 2004, when the news arrived that he had died in a motorbike accident in the protected area where he lived.
The trial of the perpetrators of the Riboli kidnapping has concluded with the prescription declaration. The attorney general who had to ask for it at the time, Francesco Maisto, apologized to the family as he could do nothing but acknowledge the truth that emerged too late.
In 1992, Zagari’s memorial was entrusted to the Prealpina journalist Gianni Spartà: given that it contained the names of people who would be arrested months later, Spartà kept it in a drawer for the time necessary to avoid ruining the investigation. Only later would it become the book Killing is tired republished in 2024 by Ariberti, the film that was based on it was able to count on the consultancy of Spartà.
