Rome - A total of seven people were killed in two separate shootings near the southern Italian town of Caserta late Thursday, police reported. Six Africans were killed and another heavily injured in an incident attributed to the Mafia near Castel Volturno, 35 kilometres north-west of Naples.
While five of them were killed on site, the sixth victim died in hospital on Friday. Italian newspapers referred to the shootings as massacre and execution.
The bloodshed could be linked to illegal drugs market or the profitable prostitution business, it was reported.
The victims were believed to be immigrants from Ghana, Liberia and Togo.
Only 20 minutes before the incident near Castel Volturno, unidentified gunmen killed a casino manager in Baia Verde, only a few kilometres away.
While investigators initially did not see a connection between both acts of revenge, the bull casings discovered on site point to the Naples mafia organization Camorra as initiator of the crimes.
The victim Antonio Celiento, a 53-year-old casino owner, is attributed to the mafia's regional Schiavone clan.
