Rome, March 2 (LaPresse) – Nitto Santapaola, considered one of the most powerful and ruthless mafia bosses of Cosa Nostra, died this afternoon at around 6:30 p.m. He was 87. Sentenced to life imprisonment, he passed away in the prison ward of the San Paolo Hospital in Milan. Benedetto Santapaola, known as Nitto, was born in Catania on June 4, 1938. Arrested at dawn on May 18, 1993, in a farmhouse in the countryside of Mazzarrone after eleven years as a fugitive, he was being held under the 41-bis regime, the so-called hard prison system. The undisputed head of Cosa Nostra in Catania, he was known for his ruthless criminal strategy and his alliances with the Corleonesi led by Totò Riina. He was definitively sentenced to life imprisonment as the instigator of numerous massacres and played a role in the operational phase of the Capaci bombing on May 23, 1992.