Pizzo (mafia)
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
(Redirected from Pizzo (extortion))
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The pizzo is protection money paid to the Mafia often in the form of a forced transfer of money, resulting in extortion. The term is derived from the Sicilian pizzu ('beak'). To let someone wet their beak (Sicilian language "fari vagnari u pizzu") is to pay protection money. The practice is widespread in Southern Italy, not only by the Sicilian Cosa Nostra, but also by the 'Ndrangheta in Calabria and the Camorra in Campania.
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