A journalist, he was waiting to be permanently employed by his newspaper, but the hiring came only after his death. At a very young age, Giancarlo Siani began to collaborate with some Neapolitan periodicals, taking an interest in the problems of the world of work and marginalised individuals , the main labour force of the organised crime syndicate, the Camorra. Then Siani started working as a correspondent from Torre Annunziata for the newspaper Il Mattino which relied upon the separate editorial staff based in Castellammare di Stabia. Siani carried out important investigations on local bosses, an excellent piece of reporting that led him to become correspondent for the newspaper within a year and to have the promise of a formal contract. Giancarlo Siani, in the article published on the 10th June 1985 – an article that the prosecutor Armando D’Alterio who led the investigation into his murder, regarded as his death sentence – wrote that the arrest of the boss Valentino Gionta was possible due to a “tip-off” from the Nuvoletta clan to the police. In fact, Gionta the boss of Torre Annunziata had been arrested in Marano, Nuvoletta territory. Siani’s intuition had provoked the wrath of the Nuvoletta brothers who, in the eyes of the other Neapolitan bosses, were made to appear treacherous. On September 23rd 1985, shortly after turning 26, Giancarlo Siani was killed at 9.50 pm. He had just left the central editorial office of Il Mattino whose chief editor at the time was Pasquale Nonno.
(Source: Unci – the national union of Italian reporters- with the contribution of family members)
(Update by Raffaella Della Morte – 3 May 2020)
Twelve years had to pass before dealing with the causes that had led organized crime to take Siani’s life. The truth was obtained thanks to the investigations conducted by the young Prosecutor of the Italian Republic Armando D’Alterio together with the “flying squad” of Naples.
- 1997 – On the 15th April 1997 the second section of the Naples Court of Assizes sentenced to life imprisonment the brothers Lorenzo and Angelo Nuvoletta and Luigi Baccante as instigators of the murder and Ciro Cappuccio and Armando Del Core as executors of it. That same sentence included also the boss Valentino Gionta for having ordered it. The sentence was confirmed by the Court of Cassation, which however had ordered the referral regarding Valentino Gionta to another Court of Assizes of Appeal.
- 2003 – In order to determine the responsibility of Valentino Gionta a trial was held which on the 29th September 2003 sentenced him to life imprisonment on appeal. Subsequently, the Supreme Court has definitively cleared him for not having committed the crime. To determine his acquittal were the reconstructions of those collaborators with justice system according to whom, when Valentino Gionta was asked by the exponents of the Nuvoletta clan, to participate in the murder of the journalist, he had opposed the crime. In Gionta’s opinion the predictable reaction from the state would have caused problems for the activities of the clans in Torre Annunziata where Siani had worked. Valentino Gionta received several convictions for other Camorra crimes, including associating with a mafia-like organisation.
- On October 20, 2013 Angelo Nuvoletta dies in prison.
- 2014 – In an investigative book published twenty-nine years after Siani’s death, the Neapolitan journalist Roberto Paolo raised some doubts about the identity of the real perpetrators of the murder and indicated the names of other possible principals and executors. The revelations collected in Paolo’s book attribute responsibility for the murder to the Giuliano di Forcella clan. The alleged motive was the fact that Siani collected and published news that annoyed the Camorra in the business of managing the cooperatives of former prisoners, on which the Neapolitan clan and that of Torre Annunziata made large profits. A scenario that, according to Roberto Paolo could be linked with the elements with which the Giontas and Nuvolettas were charged.
