Italian banker extradited on money laundering charges

BANGKOK, December 21 (TNA) - A Thai court has ordered the extradition of an Italian banker who was found guilty of laundering money for some top Italian mobsters through New York pizzerias in the 1970s-1980s. The Italian fugutive banker, 65-year-old Sicilian Vito Roberto Palazzolo, was arrested at Bangkok's international airport on March 30, 2012 when he was about to board a flight to South Africa, his adopted homeland, under the name of Robert von Palace Kolbatschenko. Handcuffed and dressed in Thailand's orange prison uniform while being taken to a prison van, Palazzolo told reporters, "I'm very happy to go back home." The Criminal Court in Bangkok said the extradition will take at least 30 days, mainly to process paperwork. Thai police were earlier tipped off by Italian authorities who had been monitoring Facebook and other social media postings by Palazzolo and his family. Palazzolo was convicted in Italy in 2006, following the "Pizza Connection" investigation, which exposed a 1.6 billion-US dollar-heroin and cocaine smuggling operation that used New York pizzerias as fronts from 1975 to 1984. Prosecutors alleged, while working in Switzerland as a banker, Palazzolo laundered money for some of Italy's top mobsters, a charge he has denied, but he was sentenced to nine years in prison for links to the mafia. Italy's highest court in 2009 upheld Palazzolo's conviction and sentence for the mafia association. (TNA)