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Authorities in Italy and the U.S. had long suspected the existence of the Sicilian connection, and in the late 1970s rapidly expanded joint efforts to expose and eliminate it. The cooperation has become extensive. U.S. authorities have traveled to Italy to share information with their Italian counterparts; Assistant U.S. Attorney Charles Rose flew to Brazil last year after Buscetta's arrest. Only hours after those named in the Italian arrest warrants had been taken into custody in the U.S., top law-enforcement officials from both countries met at the Justice Department in Washington to make plans for combined police actions and prosecutions in the U.S. and Italy. The 14-member Italian-American working group has encouraged local law-enforcement officials. "It's about time law enforcement got as organized as organized crime," says Giuliani.
Aiding the joint effort is a new extradition treaty (see box). Italy has requested the extradition of at least 16 men rounded up last week in the U.S. Giuliani indicated that he expects Buscetta to be brought to the U.S. to provide general information on the Mafia. And possibly for his own safety. Some law-enforcement authorities speculate that Buscetta can be better protected in the U.S. than in Italy, where Mafia dons have long found it even easier than their American counterparts to run their affairs from prison cells. Some Mafiosi, however, feel that Buscetta's days are numbered wherever he is. Asked how long he thought Buscetta would survive, one New York family man merely shrugged and offered his questioner a cup of coffee.
Many officials in both countries believe they are on the verge of a major breakthrough in their long, only partly effective war against the Mafia. Flushed with the success of their campaign to combat the political terrorism of the Red Brigades, Italian authorities have been moving against the Mafia with increasing vigor in recent months. Meanwhile, the U.S. has also been doing better as it has stepped up its attack on organized crime. According to FBI Director William Webster, narcotics investigations alone produced 700 convictions in the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30, 1983. Justice Department investigations have produced such minor victories as the 1980 conviction of Joseph Bonanno for trying to thwart a grand jury investigation, the 1980 conviction of Crime Family Boss Frank Tieri for racketeering, and the 1981 conviction of New Orleans Crime Chief Carlos Marcello for conspiracy in a bribery and kickback scheme.
These convictions have not crippled the Mafia, which, as both the 1981 fatal bombing of Philadelphia Mobster Philip Testa and the recent indictments of New York mobsters for conspiracy in connection with Suffolk County garbage collections attest, is amply active. The President's Commission on Organized Crime, established last summer, estimates that the Mafia takes in up to $168 billion a year in the U.S., or more than the gross domestic products of Greece and Austria combined. Says FBI Director Webster: "There are few businesses or industries in our communities that are not affected by organized-criminal enterprises. This brand of crime is costing the American people billions of dollars every year."