The small skirmishes that had consistently accompanied the mob’s existence were a far cry from the battles that broke out in the 1980s, leaving dozens and hundreds of mobsters dead. The great revolts of the early 1980s changed the sociopolitical climate of the mafia world and tipped the balance in favor of its instigators, the hitherto powerless Corleonesi.
The Corleonesi were initially shunned by mob bosses not only because they came from a rural town called Corleone, but also because they came from little power. This changed when the ruthless Luciano Leggio assumed leadership within the clan, and the Corleonesi gained the support of the other mob families. With this new power, Leggio had a habit of eliminating rival mob bosses. When Leggio went into hiding, her successor Riina displayed the same cruelty. Testimony to this was on April 23, 1981, when his rival Bontade was machine-gunned to death. Inzerillo, another rival, was killed in another bullet storm a few days later.
November 30, 1982 was a day for history books. Twelve mobsters were killed in twelve separate incidents in Palermo, with some corpses turning up in distant locations. As of 1981, some 500 gangsters were killed and more than 160 disappeared.
The Carleonesi family became indisputably the most powerful and violent force of this decade. Contrary to the Sicilian way of killing state authorities only when they had no other choice, the Carleonesi spared no one, not even state figures who were anti-mafia.