Giovanni Brusca, an Italian mafia boss, released after 25 years in prison | Court Matters

Relatives of the victims of Brusca’s recent political upheaval have not moved, although the assassins provide the government with information necessary for the arrests.

Italians are outraged by the release of a prominent Cosa Nostra mafia official who, among other things, assassinated a prosecutor and melted the boy’s body into acid.

Sicilian Mafia converter Giovanni Brusca, 64, was released from a Roman prison in Rebibbia on Monday after serving 25 years in prison.

He was arrested in 1996, four years after the bombing of Giovanni Falcone, an Italian judge dedicated to cracking down on the mafia.

The attack also killed Falcone’s wife and three policemen.

Brusca, known as a “murderer”, has admitted responsibility for killing more than 100 people, including the death of a 14-year-old child; Giuseppe Di Matteo, the son of a mafia reporter, was killed and melted in acid.

But after changing government, Brusca assisted prosecutors in the fight against the Cosa Nostra families.

He described the horrific killings of Cosa Nostra during the 1980’s and 1990’s and testified at court hearings between Italian officials and terrorists that they could stop the bombing.

‘Not just Italian justice’

Prior to Monday’s release, Brusca had already been granted temporary leave from prison. He will be on parole for four years, Italian journalists said.

His release brought grief and anger among his relatives.

“He made a pact with justice just to make a profit, it was not a choice,” Rosaria Costa, a widow of the Falcone bomber, told Corriere della Sera newspaper.

Maria Falcone, the judge’s sister, said she was “saddened” but realized that the law gives Brusca the right to be released from prison.

Both political parties in Italy have also criticized the decision to release Brusca.

The leader of the Democratic Party’s left-wing party, Enrico Letta, called it “a punch in the stomach that leaves one speechless, I wonder how it can be done”.

Right-wing leader Matteo Salvini, League Party leader, said: “The man who did this, the one who dissolved the child in acid, the one who killed Falcone, I think is a monster and will never get out of prison.

“It’s not ‘justice’ that Italians deserve.”

But Federico Cafiero De Raho, Italy’s chief mafia judge, defended the decision.

“No matter what one might think of the atrocities committed at the time, there was a connection … Let’s not forget that he provided information on the bombing in Sicily and in northern Italy,” De Raho told Reuters.

“Obviously, the judges believe this was the right time to be in prison.”