A top Italian judge publicly framed the mafia as cooperative with state law.

Evidence

The mafia has been said to despise the police and the judiciary. This is inaccurate. The mafia has always respected the judiciary—the law—and bowed to its verdicts; nor has it obstructed the judges’ work. In hunting bandits and outlaws … it even sided with law enforcers… Nowadays a name is circulating within this secret consorteria as the official successor to Don Calogero Vizzini [the mafia’s alleged chief in the 1940s and 1950s]. May he contribute to respect for the law of the state and the social advancement of the community. — Diego Gambetta, The Sicilian Mafia The Business of…, 17

Categorization

• XREF: The judge’s depiction of the mafia hunting bandits ‘with’ enforcers parallels how a protection firm polices its own turf—violence in service of order, in both the Gambetta and the reader’s Bonasera frame.