Inside The Mafia: The Murder Of Peppino Impastato | Great Crimes And Trials | Absolute Crime

in 1978 Mafia supro Gano bti is running one of the largest transcontinental crime Rings the US and Europe has ever seen this same year the bloody remains of former family friend and political activist jeppi Pepino Impastato are found on a sicilian Railway line authorities declare his death is as a result of a failed terrorist attempt or suicide a conclusion his supporters firmly reject it will take a quarter of a century for Pepino's family to finally face bti in [Music] [Music] court [Music] Pepino Impastato is born in the pretty coastal town of chin in Sicily's Northwest in 1948 like many in Sicily at the time his father Luigi has links to the local [Music] Mafia he counts among his friends and neighbors a local Mafia enforcer Gano bti both work for Pino's Uncle the mafia boss man [Music] lot the young Pino is particularly close to his uncle and grows up on the manzela farm with his parents Luigi and Felicia and younger brother [Music] Giovani but in 1963 a horrific event changes the two brothers whole attitude to the Mob [Music] their uncle jazire is blown up by a car bomb but Gano badti has a very different reaction for him Manzel's death is an opportunity he now takes control of the Mafia and it makes him Rich his businesses start getting lucrative construction contracts from the local government including the expansion of Poo's airport which helps his own growing drug trafficking business between Sicily and the US the two men Pepino and bti who had once been friends find themselves on a course that will see them come to blows for nearly 15 [Music] years because Pepino devotes himself to a whole host of anti-ia causes he founds an anti-ia radio station he runs an anti-ia newspaper he holds impromptu anti-ia gatherings in Ten's Town Square and the target of many of his attacks is his neighbor and former family friend Kitano bti I think that's an interesting thing this one piece will make 52 layers watch on mobile devices or the big screen all for free no subscription required in his satirical radio broadcasts Pepino ridicules him while accusing in him of corruption and drug [Applause] trafficking despite the obvious risks of taking on the mafia Pino's mother stands up for him for Pino's father Luigi a low-ranking member of the chin Mafia Pino's Behavior puts him in a difficult and dangerous position in 1977 Luigi is walking home from [Applause] work when he is hit by by a car and killed in an apparent accident then 8 months [Music] later at dawn on May the 9th 1978 the carabinieri the local police are called to a secluded spot on the outskirts of Jin SE a section of Railway track has been blown apart a man's Bloody remains are scattered over a 300 met area they are the remains of Pino Impastato Alberto Santino is another political activist from nearby palmo the local police offer two explanations either Pino has accidentally killed himself while planting a bomb or he's committed suicide and local newspapers support their Claims One headline reads leftist fanatic blown apart by own bomb on Railway track Pepino's friends however are convinced these claims make no sense their suspicions are further raised when they find blood inside a small shack just yards from the railway line the Shack's entrance points away from the railway tracks there is no way the blood could have got in there as a result of the explosion so how has it got there amidst the circulating rumors and suspicions about how he died Pino's funeral on the 10th of May is a massive outpouring of grief and anger a multitude turn out in support of the anti-ia [Music] campaigner [Music] for [Music] Pepino's mother Felicia and brother Giovani together with Alberto Santino now resolve to uncover the truth ignoring continuing dangers Santina with the family's support now begins a campaign to bring B lenti to Justice together they start to gather evidence [Music] but finding out what really happened on the night of May the 8th proves very difficult if the mafia were responsible for Pino's death their plan had been very effective the campaigners believe Pepino's history of political activism provided bti with the perfect scenario with which to Stage his death in the 1970s Italy had suffered a wave of violence at the hands of Hardline communist groups family and friends believe that b lenti had used this political climate to make Pino's death appear as if he had accidentally blown himself up while planting a terrorist bomb but his family and friends think it would have been totally out of character for him to commit an act of violence not least because it would have hurt the very workers he often campaigned [Music] for such is bti's power and influence around in see the family are convinced that the local police don't want to get to the bottom of what really happened for 6 years the family gets nowhere meanwhile battle's operation continues to grow he has become one of the key players of a multi-million dollar heroin trafficking operation that Imports heroin from the Middle East and distributes it across America through a chain of pizza parlers but then there's an unexpected breakthrough for Pino's family federal law enforcement officials are celebrating what they consider to be a major victory in their war against organized crime a former head of the Sicilian Mafia and 16 other reputed organized crime figures convicted yesterday of running one of the biggest heroin smuggling rings ever uncovered battle is tried and found guilty in a New York Court for masterminding a 9-year long $1.65 billion drugs ring known as The Pizza Connection the 17-month trial of 22 Sicilian Mafia men turns into a media circus battle amenti is the key player in the operation distribut heroin and cocaine and coordinating a stream of violent crimes in 1987 the 63-year-old battle LTI is sentenced to 45 years in a US prison boyed by the spectacle of batt lenti on trial in the US back in Sicily Pepino's mother Felicia desperate to bring the killer of her son to justice decides to write a book in it she recalls an incident when her husband was summoned by [Music] [Music] parenti Felicia's recollection is clearly [Music] significant but there's still a long way to go to corroborate it then in 1994 with battle amenti Behind Bars they get the witness they need a member of the chiny mafia salvator palazolo has turned police informant he claims to have information from a relation and battle's right-hand man veto palazolo about Pino's death the family asked the police to confront him this is the evidence they are looking for bti it seems really had given an order to kill [Music] Pepino in 1996 nearly 20 years after Pino's death a dossier detailing the role of Gano badalamenti in the death of the young activist is presented to the Italian courts eventually the cas is reopened at last the family can seek Justice now an elderly woman Felicia invites television cameras into her home finally in 2000 the case comes to trial the family prepared to confront the man they believe to be Pepino's murderer inside the court of palmo a 77-year-old Gano bti appears from fton prison New Jersey the prosecution aim for Maximum Impact they call Felicia as a [Music] witness Felicia takes the stand and identifies the murderer of her son the court is told at length why battle had a powerful motive for killing Pepino they hear how Pino had criticized battle's business dealings including his Construction company's Shady building activities and his drug trafficking business and significantly the court is told that in the days leading up to his death Pepino had been standing as a candidate in the local elections on an anti-mafia ticket if Pino had won the election it would have given him the means to curb baden's illicit activities the prosecution then explains what it thinks really happened to Pepino on the night of the 8th of May 1978 he had been followed on his drive home after his shift at his radio station radio out just a few miles from home Pino was pulled from his car and taken to the stone Shack close to the railway line he was then violently beaten with stones it accounts for the blood splatter found by Pino's friends in the shack yet ignored by police Pino was then dragged either semiconscious or unconscious to the deserted Railway line and laid across the tracks on top of 5 kg of TNT an explosive often used by battle's construction companies the charge was then detonated crucially the court hears that a forensic examination of a stone collected from The Shack by one of Pepino's friends on the morning after his death is covered in blood which is an exact match with [Music] Pinos for Pino's family the description of exactly what happened to him is horrific [Music] finally the prosecution rests with battle lenti looking on his legal council now put the case for the [Music] defense battle amenti denies any association with the Sicilian Mafia it's designed to show he had no motive for killing an anti Mafia campaigner and he goes a step further the defense also point out that battle amenti is an old friend of Pino's family and could therefore never have hurt him and they even claim he supported Pino's politics but this is refus Ed by the deposition of Mafia Informer Salvatore palazolo he flatly contradicts battle lenti confirming that he had information from battle's Deputy that the mafia boss had ordered the murder of Pino Impastato the jury retired to consider their verdict after only one day of deliberation on April the 11th 2002 the court of palmo reaches its decision Gano bti is finally found guilty of the murder of Pepino Impastato but for the family there are more mixed feelings [Music] [Music] is given a life sentence he dies in prison 2 years later in 2004 aged 80 two months after that Pino's mother Felicia also passes away but her job is done she and her family's fight for justice gains legendary status back [Music] home [Music] the story of the impostato family has become part of Sicilian folklore it has come to represent the wider fight of ordinary people against the mafia Pino has become a true hero a man who was born into a mafia family but chose to walk another path [Music] in the days following his death the doors of the Impastato home were thrown open to the anti-mafia [Music] movement today they remain open as a permanent Memorial to Pepino Impastato and as a reminder of how a family bravely stood up to the Sicilian [Music] Mafia at first glance 69-year-old great-grandmother Fay Copeland seems a most unlikely Criminal but in November 1990 she takes the stand in a murder trial that shocks the state of Missouri we didn't think Mom had anything to do it fake Copland and her 76-year-old husband Ry are accused of tricking five homeless Drifters into an elaborate cattle rustling scam before murdering them well you won't find no bodies I think the community kind of found it hard to believe it's a story of missing people dark family secrets and coldblooded murder the question the trial must answer is fake Copeland a killer or a victim [Music] [Music] [Music] herself [Music] Livingston County in Northwest Missouri this quiet community is scattered over miles of cattle pastures and farmland the only city chilo has a population of just 9 a half thousand it's a small enough community that we all know our neighbors and uh we all watch after each other watch after our property and things like that and I'm sure most people never lock their doors but in the fall of 1986 something menacing unsettles the people of this peaceful rural area a deputy from a neighboring County visits Livingston County Deputy Gary calber he's looking for a cattle Thief he was working on a fraudulent check investigation where a Dennis Murphy had written a check for the purchase of some cows and and his information was those cows were taken from the sail Barn in a trailer owned by Ray copelan now in his 70s local resident Ray Copeland has raised five children with his wife Fay he considered himself a handyman he painted barns buildings he mowed sprayed for people if he wanted to work for you or something he was fairly friendly but if he didn't and he was around him much and he was kind of a grow old man F was a typical Farm wife uh she worked in town in chilicothe Gary Calbert and the visiting deputy sheriff drive out to Ray Copeland's Farm they hope he might be able to help them find Dennis Murphy The Drifter accused of writing the bad check Mr Copeland's response was that yes he had helped him haul some cattle he needed some place to store these cattle for a few days and then this Dennis Murphy gave took the cows and left and he didn't know where he was at or any any more information about him Gary calet thinks nothing more of it until a deputy from a nearby County comes looking for another Drifter named Wayne Warner he had also bought cattle with a bad check and again they've been hauled Away by Ray Copeland I suggested those deputies get the statements from these from Mr Warner and Mr Murphy you know if if they in if they include the Ray cop was involved somehow let me know we'll help you with the investigation the problem is the sheriff's can't find Murphy or Warner since they're known Drifters it's assumed they've simply moved on the investigation into the cattle scam goes cold then 3 years later in August 1989 a call is made to the Nebraska highway patrol hotline the caller claims a farmer from Livingston County Missouri YY forced him to buy cattle with bad checks but then he makes an extraordinary allegation that he'd seen human remains on the farmer's land and he was terrified the caller is yet another homeless Drifter Jack mccormic and the farmer he is talking about is Ray [Music] Copeland mccormic tells police he first met met Ray Copeland at a church mission in Springfield Missouri Ry had told him that he would pay him $50 a day if he would assist him in buying cattle Copeland also promised him full board and lodging to the homeless mccormic it sounded like a way out of his desperate Straits so he accepted first Copeland took mccormik to the bank and advanced him $200 to open a checking account then they went to the livestock market Copeland told McCormick to bid on the cattle because he was too deaf to hear the auctioner McCormack had to pay for the cattle with starter checks from his new bank account they made their first purchase for $2,000 and hauled away the cattle but mccomic was worried he knew there was only $200 in his account and that the check would bounce leaving him to take the wrap he tells investigators that once back at the Copeland farm he felt increasingly uneasy and that the farmer's wife Fay watched him like a hawk a few days later mccormix says he saw what appeared to be human bones near a barn and if that wasn't enough to scare him then came an incident that made made him fear for his life Ray had told him there was a raccoon in the barn and he wanted to kill this raccoon and he needed Jack's assistance so Ry had a 22 rifle in his hand he went out to the barn Ry gave him a stick and said poke the stick in behind the stack of hay here try to get that raccoon to come out and I shoot him you sure he's in here he's in there I saw him go in there mccomic sense something was very wrong he turned to see ray copelan's gun pointing straight at him later Jack McCormack vividly recounted that day in the barn I never did take my eyes off of it I'm looking back up at him all the time I didn't want to run off cuz I afraid he would shoot me then you know at that point petrified McCormack persuaded Copeland to take him to a nearby town and there he made his Escape after hearing Jack McCormack's horrifying story Gary calet revisits the cases of missing Drifters Dennis Murphy and Wayne Warner he checks to see if there's any sign of their activities by examining their bank accounts driver's licenses and Social Security records but the men seem to have vanished Without a Trace with an emerging pattern of bad checks two missing Drifters and Jack McCormack's statement suggesting Foul Play Sheriff's obtain a search warrant for the Copeland [Music] Farm on October the 9th 1989 Fay and Ray Copeland are arrested initially the charges are conspiracy to commit theft in reference to Murphy and Warner's fraudulent checks just before the arrests Ray and Fa son Al Copeland and his wife sense something strange is going on the day before they were arrested uh they were over at our house Mom and Dad both and uh mom wanted to say something never did was able to say anything and the only thing we heard was Dad telling her to shut up and let's go I knew something was going on Deputy Gary calvit interviews Ray Copeland about the two missing Drifters but he denies any knowledge of their whereabouts so you didn't have anything to do with their disappearance I had F cand makes the same claim F never really said anything that um the only thing she said was basically don't believe what you hear right now in the meantime Sheriff's search the Copeland's house they find bank and livestock records and several Firearms but they also find men's clothing some with name tags that they suspect belonged to transient Farm hands most of their clothes and stuff you know that's all their possessions they have they just don't leave them around if they if they move on they take their belongings with them most disturbing of all sheriffs find a handwritten list of names on a small scrap of Note Paper next to several names is the word back investigators discover these men had been approached by Copeland but had not gone through with buying cattle they are found alive and well other names are marked with an ex and all those men are missing now Gary Calbert suspects the unthinkable that Ray and Fay Copland have been killing Drifters and that perhaps this list of names is a record of what they've done the search for bodies on the Copeland's 40 Acre Farm begins in order to make the case that we needed we would have to have the bodies sheriffs also dig into Ray Copeland's past they learn that he has a long Criminal record throughout the Midwest and his favorite scan was writing bad checks he had done exactly the same thing many many years ago in a county over in Eastern Missouri and in that case they found the individual who had written the bad check he testified against Ry and Ry was sent to the penitentiary police theorized that prison must have had a profound effect on Ry and that at some point he decided he would never go back to jail again that meant he must be very careful not to leave any more witnesses behind the search for bodies intensifies we spent several days executing that warrant on the r copel far that Drew a lot of attention as you can imagine under a constant media Spotlight sheriffs spend a week scouring the Copeland property but they find nothing newk wari told us that there were B out there and we didn't find any back at the police station Gary calfor pushes Ray Copeland harder about the missing men well you won't find no bodies is that right but the worst thing about all this Mr Copeland is I think a few of these people have died as a result well if the have I didn't have anything to do with it then the investigation suffers a devastating blow Jack McCormick admits he lied about seeing human remains I told him that uh falsely to get them to investigate because I was so sure of what had taken place out here still despite the setback the evidence of bad checks missing Drifters and the list of names is enough to justify continuing the search and finally all the media attention stirs up some credible lead we get phone calls from people who would say well you know Ray worked for SST shots he remodled his barn or he fixed his fence and I was assigning deputies to follow up on each one of these phone calls one caller says he knows of a barn Ray Copeland worked on that at one point smelt of dead animals Deputy Paul STM is immediately sent to search the barn well all we was using actually it was just a steel rod it goes in the ground fairly hard if you find a place that's been Disturbed and stuff it goes in a lot [Music] easier doesn't matter how long ago it was Disturbed and covered back up it's still different from the rest of the ground in an area that looks like it's been Disturbed the deputies begin to dig it's not long before they make a Grizzly discovery a body wrapped in plastic buried in a shallow grave and still wearing his tennis [Music] shoes and right beside it are two more bodies through dental records they're identified as James Harvey John Freeman and Paul Cowart they were all Drifters and all marked with an x on the Copeland's list of names each of the three men had been killed by a gunshot to the back of the head we recovered spent bullets from each of the skulls and all three of them matched with one of the rifles that we took out of Ray home on October the 17th 1989 Ray and F Copeland are charged with three counts of first deegree murder prosecutors announced they'll be pursuing the death penalty meanwhile the search for bodies continues until sheriffs get a tip from the most unlikely Source R finds out that we found three of these bodies Ray said I understand you found some bodies and I want to help you guys out Ray Copeland tells Sheriff's he overheard three men in a restaurant talking about how they killed a man and dumped his body down a well on a nearby Farm say there is a guy in there yes sir who who who's in there I don't know that and he's got a [Music] concrete block chain around deputies are quickly dispatched to the well so we uh took a rope with a grappling hook on the end of it dropped it down in there and pulled it up time or two see if we could find anything and one time when we pulled it up it had a cowboy boot on it and cowboy boot still had what was left of the person's foot in it so that's when we took the tracko and the back ho and dug down the side of it when the body is recovered it's identified as one of the missing men who'd prompted the whole investigation Drifter Dennis Murphy next investigators search a barn just 100 ft from the well this whole Barn was completely full of big round bales like you you see back in here as we had to come in here and clear out this whole center aisle we got down to where the haze coming out of that one all the way across that stall right in there is where we found the fifth body the body is that of Wayne Warner just like the other men Warner and Murphy had been shot in the back of the head with ray copelan's gun ray and fake Copeland are now charged with all fire murders prosecutors build their case around the theory Ray pulled the trigger and Fay helped organize and cover up his crimes they decide early on to split the trials 69-year-old Fay Copeland will be tried first in the months leading up to her trial her defense prepares to argue that not only did Fay know nothing of her husband's scams or the alleged murders she's also a victim of Ray Copeland's brutality to assess her state of mind they sent her to psychologist Marilyn Hutchinson she came as a regular therapy client brought by the deputies pretty much weekly for about 9 months she looked extraordinarily beaten down a very very sad sad person F Copeland would say nothing against her husband but after several sessions and after talking to fa's children Marilyn Hutchinson begins to form a picture of a family dominated and controlled by Ray Copeland he was the complete dictator and anyone who crossed him or for any reason that he was offended or upset he would physically lash out at whoever was closest or whoever was on his mind by way I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm getting they' met when Ray Copeland was 26 and Fay 19 by then he'd already served time for forging checks the two were married after just a few months but Marilyn Hutchinson learns that Ry soon showed his true colors right after they were married he refused to pay her father for some work that her father had done for him he stole food from her parents and he tried to rape her sister despite it all fa by her husband she always put him first that was the nature of her life fa son Al also suffered at the hands of his brutal father he got mad at not being able to hammer a nail into a piece of wood and I was in the wrong place at the wrong time he beat me with a pair of metal calak I mean that was common place for him the only thing he had to do was stay out of his way the five Copeland children left home as soon as they were old enough but fa stayed you could see bruises on her days that we would either either come over and visit him or whatever you could see a black eye or where he had hit her on her face or something not long before the trial prosecutors offer Fay Copeland a deal if she talks they'll take the death penalty off the table and she could spend just a few years in jail but again she denies knowing anything we visited her quite a bit and she would still not say anything to anyone of us mom was afraid to death of Ray and it wasn't nothing we boys could do anything about it based on fa's therapy sessions with Marilyn Hutchinson the defense will argue that Fay Copeland is a victim of battered woman syndrome and that even now Ry controls her due to years of physical and emotional abuse she had been taught for decades to not even ask him a question let alone criticize him that's part of what's called learned helplessness and it's the phenomena that when you've been beaten down so much and so long and so hard that even if the gate door is left open on the con conentration Camp people sometimes didn't run because they just had lost the ability to see an [Music] opportunity on the 1st of November 1990 F Copeland goes to trial and pleads not guilty the defense are confident that with Marilyn Hutchinson's expert testimony on battered woman syndrome they will be able to argue successfully that F Copeland is not accountable for the murders because she was totally controlled by her husband the verdict will hinge on whether the jury believes it but then there is a major setback because there had been paperwork filed incorrectly and because the Attorney General objected I was not allowed to testify with the defense of battered woman syndrome ruled out fake Copeland's attorneys are left with very little to contradict the prosecution's evidence against her first prosecutors call Jack McCormick to the stand he testifies that F Copeland handled the books and took care of the transients that stayed at the house they displayed the drifter's clothing found hanging in the closet and a quilt Fay had made with some of it finally they presented the scrap of note paper listing the names of the murdered men marked with an [Music] ex crucial to the prosecution handwriting experts established the list was written by F Copeland they say it makes her just as culpable as her husband Ry she was Ray's bookkeeper she had to know something was going on there's no doubt in my mind Marilyn Hutchinson remains convinced the list does not mean Fay was involved but she's powerless to say so at the trial Ry was illiterate and could not write Ry had told told her to write down particular names and sometimes he told her to put ex's by them true to form she didn't question why they were ex's finally prosecutors show the jury a letter written by Fay to Ray while in jail 4 days after their arrest discussing the search on their Farm Fay wrote nothing found nothing gained and that things will cool down the prosecution argued that this is one piece of evidence that should eliminate all doubt about F Copeland's guilt Marilyn Hutchinson on the other hand believes it's simply a letter from a loyal wife trying to support her husband she continues to write to him and and support him and encourage him in the same kind of ways that she had been trained to do so um there was nothing in that note or that letter that was surprising to me the lay jury listened to what sounded like a cover up note and took it for that without Marilyn Hutchinson's expert testimony on battered woman's syndrome the evidence against Fay is overwhelming and at no point in the trial does Fay Copeland testify that she was abused by her husband the jury deliberates for 3 hours before returning their verdict guilty of murder in the first degree she always said she was innocent that she didn't know what was going on or didn't have anything to do with it and the evidence as far as I'm concerned showed that she did fake opland is sentenced to death by lethal injection on March the 7th 1991 it's Ray Copeland's turn in court the trial is almost an exact replica of phas with overwhelming physical evidence after a 10-day trial the jury deliberates for Just 2 and a half hours they find Ray Copeland guilty on all five counts of first-degree murder he too is sentenced to death but his sentence is never carried out 2 years later 78-year-old Ray Copeland dies of natural causes while awaiting execution she loved him from the day they got married to the day he died it was my love the love of my life my kids I will always be a love in my heart for it after her husband's death F Copeland would still say very little but she does begin to open up about the way he treated her in a 1999 appeal her death sentence is commuted to life in prison based on undisclosed testimony on battered woman syndrome then in 2002 after serving 12 years F Copeland suffers a stroke and is sent to a nursing home she dies a year later aged 82 I loved my mom to this day I still love her did Fay Copeland write the men's names on that list because her husband told her to or was she keeping track of their horrific crimes we'll never know how much she really knew or whether she participated in the murders and there are three more Drifters known to have encountered the Copeland who are still missing there's still a possibility there's some out out here somewhere we just don't know and it' probably be an accident if anybody ever finds [Music] him [Music] aome

Channel: Absolute Crime

Views: 5,042

Keywords: Absolute Crime, Crime Documentaries, True Crime, True Crime Documentaries, Murder documentaries, True Crime Stories, True Crime Youtube Channel, True Crime Documentary, full documentary channel, full length documentary 2022, prison documentaries

Id: 9LY6nixicAo

Length: 54min 6sec (3246 seconds)

Published: Thu Apr 18 2024