Leonardo Vitale

Leonardo Vitale (June 27, 1941 in Palermo – December 2, 1984 in Palermo) was a member of the Sicilian Mafia who was one of the first to become an informant, or pentito, although originally his confessions were not taken seriously. Vitale was a man of honour or member of the Altarello di Baida cosca or family, Altarello being a small village just outside Palermo. The Vitale family had a long history of Mafia membership and Leonardo himself was groomed by his uncle and presented for membership into Cosa Nostra in order to continue his family's Mafia tradition.

He walked into a Palermo police station on the evening of March 29, 1973, and declared that he was a member of the Mafia and confessed to various acts of extortion, arson and two homicides. In front of dumbfounded police officers he explained how a Mafia family is organised and revealed the existence of the Mafia Commission, long before the pentito Tommaso Buscetta exposed Mafia secrets to judges who were prepared to listen.

Vitale said he joined the Mafia at nineteen at the behest of his uncle. He proved his willingness to kill by shooting a horse and subsequently he murdered a rival mafioso. He went on to take part in extorting and intimidating landowners and shopkeepers, and later carried out a second killing. Vitale would eventually rise to the rank of capo-decina or captain within the crime family, leading a crew of picciotti or soldati, otherwise known as soldiers. In explaining why he had turned himself in, something that was unheard of from a mafioso at that point, Vitale claimed to have had a spiritual crisis and wanted to unburden himself. Whilst held in custody he smeared excrement on himself and practised self mutilation as his own act of contrition.

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