A former Italian mafia boss serving a life sentence will teach a
course on prison law for practising lawyers, with classes to be
held in the remote facility where he is being held in
Sardinia.
"Marcello Dall'Anna has completely changed since the days when he
was a leader of the Sacra Corona Unita" mafia in southern Italy,
Monica Murru, a lawyer who has been helping him organise the
course, told AFP.
"He has distanced himself from his past," she said.
Dell'Anna, who is now 46, was convicted at the age of 23 for
ordering contract killings and is currently being held near Nuoro
in a mountainous part of Sardinia.
The classes will be limited to 20 lawyers "for reasons of space" in
the prison despite the high demand and the course starts on January
24, finishing on March 21.
Two prisoners who acted in the award-winning film "Caesar Must Die"
about the staging of Shakespeare's Julius Caesar in a Rome prison
will also attend.
As a maximum-security inmate, Dell'Anna enjoys few privileges but
managed to obtain a law degree in prison by taking courses and
exams in prison, and was only allowed out for 14 hours in 2012 for
his graduation.
He is campaigning for his security status to be lowered -- a move
that under current regulation would only be allowed if he becomes a
state informer, something Murru said he has not done "so as not to
expose his family".
He has a wife and son from before he was jailed.
Dell'Anna is a published author in legal journals and will receive
a small payment for the course. Murru said he could stay objective
despite his own position.
"He manages to distance himself from his status as a prisoner. It
makes him feel needed," she said, adding: "Hopefully, he will teach
more courses."
