Roberto Saviano - Gomorrah - A Personal Journey into the Violent International Empire of Naples’ Organized Crime System

One place in particular has been threatened by the disappearance of these midrange industries: Parco Verde in Caivano. Its breath cut short, its growth stunted, it has become the emblem of the outer edge of urban sprawl. Here the lights are always on, the houses full of people, the courtyards crowded, the cars parked. No one leaves. Some people arrive, but few stay. There’s never a moment when the apartment houses are empty, never that sense of stillness after everyone has gone off to work or school in the morning. There’s always a crowd here, the incessant noise of people.

Parco Verde rises up just off the central axis of the city, the knife of tar that slices right through Naples. It seems more like a junk pile than a neighborhood, cement constructions with aluminum balconies swelling like carbuncles from every opening. It looks like one of those places an architect who got his inspiration at the beach designed, as if he’d meant the buildings to look like sand castles, the kind made from pails of sand dumped upside down. Dull, featureless buildings. In one corner is a tiny chapel. You almost don’t notice it, but that wasn’t always the case. There used to be a big, white chapel, a full-scale mausoleum dedicated to a boy named Emanuele. Emanuele was killed on the job. A job that in some places is even worse than moonlighting in a factory. But it’s a way to make a living. Emanuele did robberies. He’d strike on Saturdays—every Saturday. Always in the same place. Same time, same street, same day. Because Saturday was the day for his victims, the day for lovers. And Route 87 was where all the lovers in the area went. A shitty road of patched tar and mini-landfills. Every time I pass there and see the couples, I think you must have to really unleash a lot of passion to feel good in such a disgusting setting. It was here that Emanuele and his two friends hid, waiting for a car to park, for the lights to be switched off. They’d wait a few more minutes—to give them time to get undressed—and then, when the lovers were most vulnerable, they’d strike. They’d shatter the window with the butt of a pistol and stick the barrel under the man’s nose. After cleaning out their victims, they’d head off for the weekend with dozens of robberies under their belts and 500 euros in their pockets: meager booty, but it felt like a fortune.

Then one night a patrol of carabinieri intercepts them. Emanuele and his accomplices are so reckless that they don’t realize that constantly pulling the same moves in the same location is the best way to get arrested. A chase, the cars ram into each other, shots ring out. Then all is still. Emanuele is in the car, mortally wounded. He’d pointed a pistol at the carabinieri, so they kill him, eleven shots in just a few seconds. Firing eleven shots at point-blank means your gun is aimed and you’re ready to shoot at the least provocation. Shoot to kill first, and think of it as self-defense later. The bullets had flown in like the wind, drawn to Emanuele’s body as to a magnet. His friends stop the car and are about to flee, but give up as soon as they realize Emanuele is dead. They open the car doors, putting up no resistance to the fists in the face that are a prelude to every arrest. Emanuele is bent over himself, a fake pistol in his hand. A cap gun, the kind that used to be called a dog-chaser, good for keeping stray dogs out of the chicken coop. A toy wielded as if it were real; after all, Emanuele was a kid who acted like a grown man, with a frightened look that feigned ruthlessness, and a desire for pocket money that pretended to be a thirst for riches. Emanuele was fifteen years old. Everyone called him Manù. He had a lean, dark, angular face, the kind you picture when you imagine the last kid you’d want to hang out with. Emanuele came from a corner of the world where you don’t win honor and respect merely for having pocket money, but for how you get it. Emanuele belonged to Parco Verde. And when you come from a place that brands you, no mistake or crime can cancel out the fact of your belonging. The Parco Verde families took up a collection and built a small mausoleum. Inside they placed an image of the Neapolitan Madonna dell’Arco and a photo of Emanuele smiling. Emanuele’s chapel was one of the more than twenty the faithful had built in honor of every Madonna imaginable. But the mayor couldn’t stand that this one was dedicated to a lowlife, so he sent in a bulldozer to knock it down. The cement building crumbled instantly, as if it were made out of modeling clay. Word spread quickly, and the youth of Parco Verde arrived on their Vespas and motorcycles. No one spoke. They all just stared at the man working the bulldozer levers. Under the weight of their gaze, he stopped and pointed to the marshal as if to say that he was the one who’d given the order. A gesture to identify the object of their wrath and remove the target from his own chest. Frightened, besieged, he locked himself in. A second later the fighting began. He managed to flee in a police car as the kids began attacking the bulldozer with fists and feet. They emptied beer bottles and filled them with gas, tilting their motor scooters to drain the fuel right into the bottles, and threw rocks at the windows of a nearby school. If Emanuele’s chapel had to come down, then so did all the rest. Dishes, vases, and silverware flew from apartment windows. Firebombs were hurled at the police. Trash cans were lined up as barricades, and everything they could get their hands on was set on fire. Preparations for guerrilla warfare. There were hundreds of them, they’d be able to hold out a long time. The rebellion was spreading, and soon it would reach Naples proper.

But then someone arrived, from not too far away. The whole area was surrounded by police and carabinieri cars, but a black SUV had managed to get past the barricades. The driver gave a signal, someone opened the door, and a few of the rebels got in. In less than two hours everything was dismantled. Handkerchiefs came off faces, barricades of burning trash were extinguished. The clans had intervened, who knows which one. Parco Verde is a gold mine for Camorra laborers. Anyone who wants conscripts can round them up here: the bottom rung, unskilled workers who make even less than the Nigerian or Albanian pushers. Everybody wants Parco Verde kids: the Casalesi clan, the Mallardos in Giuliano, the Crispano “tiger cubs.” They become drug dealers on fixed pay, with no percentage on their sales, or drivers, or lookouts, defending territories miles from home. And to get the job they don’t even ask to be reimbursed for gas. Trustworthy kids, scrupulous in their work. Some wind up on heroin, the drug of the truly wretched. Some save themselves, enlist in the army, and get deployed; some of the girls manage to get away and never set foot in the place again. Hardly any of the younger generation become clan members; they work for the clans without ever becoming Camorristi. The clans don’t want them. They merely employ them, take advantage of the offering. These kids have no skills or commercial talent. A lot of them work as couriers, carrying backpacks filled with hashish to Rome. Motorcycle muscles flexed to the max, after an hour and a half they’re already at the capital gates. They don’t get anything for these trips, but after about twenty rounds they’re given a present—a motorcycle. To them it’s precious, beyond compare, out of reach with any other job available around here. They’ve been delivering goods that bring in ten times the cost of the motorcycle, but they don’t know that, can’t even begin to imagine it. If they get stopped at a roadblock, they’ll get less than ten years. The clan won’t cover their legal costs or guarantee assistance to their families. But there’s the roar of the exhaust in their ears and Rome to reach.

A few of the barricades came down slowly, depending on the degree of pent-up anger. Then everything fizzled. The clans weren’t afraid of the revolt. As far as they were concerned, Parco Verde could burn for days, the inhabitants could all kill each other. Except that the uproar meant no work, no reserves of cheap labor. Everything had to return to normal right away. Everyone had to get back to work, or at least be ready if they were needed. This game of revolt had to end.