Italy mints new €2 coin to mark 30 years since murders of anti-Mafia judges. The coin, to be issued in 2022, takes Tony Gentile’s famous photographs of the judges as inspiration.
Anti-Mafia judges Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino died within months of each other in 1992.
Valerio De Seta designed the commemorative coin, based on Tony Gentile’s famous photograph of the two judges. They were close friends and killed within months of each other.
Italy will mint a total of three million coins. They will have legal tender status and come into general circulation on 2 January, according to the ministry of economy and finance.
Who were Falcone and Borsellino?
Falcone and Borsellino spent most of their careers as judges and prosecuting magistrates. They worked hard to overthrow the Sicilian Mafia. They led the famous maxi-trial of 1986-1987, which dealt a blow to the Cosa Nostra with 338 convictions.
The Corleonesi Mafia assassinated Falcone in a bombing on the A29 motorway near the town of Capaci, on 23 May 1992. Falcone’s wife and three police officers also died in the blast. Borsellino died in a car bomb in Palermo, along with five police officers, on 19 July 1992.
Their deaths resulted in a huge outpouring of public grief as well as a major crackdown against the Sicilian Mafia.
A new maxi-trial is now underway against the crime syndicate, ´Ndrangheta. The first session saw 70 convictions.
