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Arrested nun to contest 'mafia link' allegations

An arrested Italian nun is expected to contest allegations that she served as a go-between for the ’Ndrangheta mafia and its jailed members at a prison in Milan.

The walls of San Vittore Prison in Milan, Italy. Saggittarius A via Wikimedia (CC BY-SA 4.0).

Sr. Anna Donelli was among 25 people arrested Dec. 5 amid an investigation into organized crime in Brescia, northern Italy.

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Brescia’s chief prosecutor Francesco Prete said investigators suspected that Donelli served as a conduit for information in Milan’s San Vittore Prison, where she has volunteered for the past 15 years.

“Regarding the nun, we need to verify this further, but investigations would have revealed a contribution by her in the exchange of news inside and outside prison,” Prete said.

Donelli, a 57-year-old member of the Sisters of Charity of Sts. Bartolomea Capitanio and Vincenza Gerosa, is under house arrest, awaiting a Dec. 13 appearance at a court in Brescia.

According to the Corriere della Sera newspaper, Donelli said it would be “shameful” to doubt her good faith.

“I have always tried to foster human relations in a positive way, I trust that the investigators will soon want to hear what I have to say,” the paper quoted her as saying.

Her lawyer Robert Ranieli said: “As a lawyer, I reserve the right to study the papers carefully, but upon first reading I see no direct and concrete evidence, only chatter from others which can lead one to think that which is not the case.”



Investigators accuse Donelli of passing messages on behalf of the Tripodi clan, a branch of the ’Ndrangheta, a crime syndicate based in Calabria, the region forming the toe of Italy’s boot.

They say they intercepted communications in which clan members referred to Donelli as “one of us.”

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At a Dec. 5 press conference, chief prosecutor Francesco Prete said: “She carried orders, directives, moral and material aid to associates, receiving in turn from the prisoners useful information to better plan criminal strategies.”

Donelli, originally from Cremona, entered the order also known as the Sisters of Maria Bambina at the age of 21. In 2001, her twin sister, a mother of three young children, was killed in a hit-and-run incident.

In 2010, Donelli began to visit prisons and deprived suburbs. She became well known in Milan also for her work with children and people struggling with drug addiction.

“If the direction is the one indicated by Jesus, ‘Blessed are the last…,’ it seems to me that this is the best way,” she told the Catholic magazine Famiglia Cristiana five years ago.

Inmates reportedly nicknamed the nun “Collina,” after the noted Italian soccer referee Pierluigi Collina, because she organized games among inmates.

In February, she received an award known as the “Golden Panettone” for her voluntary work.

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