The spectacular armored car robbery raises alarms in Italy

RomeSix million euros. That was the sum stored in the safe of an armored van that was robbed last week on the highway connecting the cities of Brindisi and Lecce in southern Italy. A heist straight out of a movie, in which a gang of thieves used machine guns and explosives against the police before fleeing. Italian authorities They suspect from the beginning that the shadow of the mafia is hiding behind the gang.The armored van had left the headquarters in Brindisi and was heading to the Bank of Italy branch in Lecce when the robbers stopped it, posing as law enforcement officers with fake police cars and flashing blue lights. In the same incident, the criminals rammed and set fire to a van and a truck to block the Carabinieri – the Italian military police – and disrupt traffic on the highway. This highway has already been the site of other similar robberies, such as the one in 2024 when a gang of thieves stole almost three million euros.

Footage of the attack, captured by drivers in oncoming traffic, quickly went viral in Italy, sparking a debate about an increasingly common phenomenon on the country's roads. In 2023, there were 15 attacks on armored vehicles—more than one per month—according to the latest available data included in a report by the Ministry of the Interior and the Italian Banking Association. This figure is lower than the previous year, but it is still a cause for concern among Italian authorities. According to the Anti-Mafia Investigation Directorate, organized crime is behind the recent attacks in Apulia. Armored truck robberies are a specialty of the Cerignola mafia, one of the three branches of the Apulian mafia, known in Italy as the fourth mafia, after the Neapolitan Camorra, the Sicilian Cosa Nostra, and, above all, the 'Ndrangheta, the most international of the four, which controls the European cocaine market from the Calà region. Experts say that the three criminal groups that control Apulia have divided the business: while the Società, which operates mainly in Foggia, focuses primarily on extortion, and the Gargano mafia on drug trafficking, the Cerignola mafia continues its illicit activities without abandoning its specialty: armored truck robberies to finance criminal activity. No happy ending

However, in last week's robbery, the outcome was not what the criminals had hoped for. According to authorities, the criminals had to flee without their prized loot after forcing a woman out of her vehicle, stealing her car, and using it to escape amidst gunfire with police. A Carabinieri patrol car was hit by some bullets, but no officers were injured, confirmed Nicola Magne, secretary of the UNARMA union, who expressed his deep concern about the rise in criminal activity and the risks law enforcement faces daily. "This crime is on the rise both because of the loot they obtain and the violence they use against law enforcement," Magne stated. Shortly afterward, the Carabinieri arrested two men allegedly involved in the robbery as they attempted to flee on foot through a rural area, unarmed but with their faces covered. Two of the vehicles used in the attack, a blue Jeep and an Alfa Romeo Stelvio, were also found in the same area. One of the two arrested is Giuseppe Iannelli, 38, a former soldier with experience in an elite unit of the Italian Navy and no prior criminal record. Giuseppe Russo, 62, was arrested alongside him. Both are being held in pretrial detention and are accused of attempted murder, aggravated robbery, possession of weapons of war and explosives, as well as resisting arrest and assaulting a public official. According to initial reconstructions, the commando consisted of between six and eight people, although Italian authorities do not rule out the possibility that the robbers had accomplices who did not directly participate in the spectacular heist.