(The Independent) A bewildered nine-year-old in Sicily has been given the highest-possible security cover with a 24-hour armed guard and anti-bomb surveillance, after a notorious Cosa Nostra boss decided that the boy's father – a magistrate who sent him to prison – "and all his spawn" should be obliterated.
The mobster who ordered the family to be killed is considered "one of the most bloodthirsty" in all of Sicily, according to Italian press reports. The prosecuting magistrate earned the mob boss's wrath by foiling a plan he had to pose as a turncoat in order to avoid jail. In reality the mobster continued to manage his criminal activity and even organise a vicious vendetta against a nephew who he felt had usurped his position in the clan.
