Luana writes her thesis on her father, who was killed by the mafia.

He had been part of a powerful clan, but after the 1992 massacres he repented. And he paid with his life for his move to the side of the state.

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Screenshot 2026 03 09 at 12.00.01

On May 10, 1996, Luigi Ilardo was killed by mafia hitmen, before the eyes of his 16-year-old daughter, Luana. Thirty years later, in February 2026, Luana graduated in Criminology with a thesis on her father's murder. 

Luigi Ilardo's story has always been shrouded in mystery, but among them were some certainties. The man, considered serious, reliable, and reserved, as well as belonging to an unsuspecting family, had been recruited by the boss Don Ciccio Madonia, to the point of agreeing to hide the fugitive Gianni Ghisena in his home. In practice, in the 80s, Ilardo was a member of Cosa Nostra, linked to the powerful Madonia mafia family of Caltanissetta.

But after the 1992 massacres, Luigi Ilardo decided to rebel, break with the criminal organization, and collaborate with the DIA, leading investigators, for example, on the trail of the highly wanted Bernardo Provenzano who, however, for reasons never fully clarified, had managed to escape just at the moment scheduled for his arrest.

Mafia codes did not allow Luigi Ilardo to change sides, and he was thus executed on May 10, 1996, when he should have been in the protection program for only five days. 

Without the shield promised by the State and with the guns of mafia killers pointed at his back, Luigi was sentenced to death, and his entire story was reconstructed in detail in the degree thesis written by his daughter Luana.  

The story of Luana Ilardo is considered symbolic because it shows three things: a mafioso who decides to change his life and join the state, a daughter who seeks truth and justice, an Italian history still full of gray areas between the mafia and institutions. So much so that Luana has written a book with a very powerful title (Luigi Ilardo: State Murder), with which she tours Sicily and Italy to talk about legality and the fight against the mafia. 

Cover image source: Avvenire

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