At least once in our
lives, we’ve all toyed with the idea of starring in our favourite film. Meet the
man whose experience could be fit for a modern spin-off of ‘The Godfather’.
“I’m from a very
rough, poor area of Rome, full of drug problems and issues with the mafia.
Basically, there’s one particular gang connected to the mafia that nobody dares
to cross, it’s just common knowledge.” Londoner, Marco Rossi* explains. “I
remember being 17 or 18 when my friend got his driver’s licence. We would drive
around our neighbourhood most nights thinking we ruled the world, until one
night we crashed into someone from behind.”
They couldn’t see who was driving it at first and although
it was a really expensive looking car, they thought insurance would cover it so
they didn’t worry too much. Things took a horrible turn when the driver got out
and Marco, who was sitting in the passenger seat, recognised him being one of
the gang members.
“We started to panic, we knew we couldn’t do this, we needed
to get out of there and we honestly thought we were going to die.” He recalls. “I
rolled down the window and he just put a gun to my
head and said ‘Okay guys,
you know we’re going to do this our way’.”
None of them knew what to do, they were frozen from the fear
they all felt. A few seconds later they could see a police car stopping behind
them and for a moment they thought they were saved. However, when the officers took
the situation in and recognised the man, all they said was ‘Sorry guys, we can’t
interfere’.
“They simply left us there with a guy who was still holding
a gun to my head.” – he says. “I did the thing I’m best at and started talking.
I was going on and on about how sorry we were, how we didn’t mean it, we didn’t
know it was him and we’d do anything he wanted us to.”
The gang member cut them a somewhat bittersweet deal; to
save themselves, they had to deliver a certain amount of marijuana to his house
the next day. They reached out to every dealer in their neighbourhood and
managed to collect enough.
The next day Marco delivered the drugs to the address and
stood there with his heart in his throat while they measured if it was the
correct amount. “I was praying that it was exactly right, otherwise they probably
would’ve shot me there and then but they let me go. I was just happy I was
still alive to be honest.” Marco remembers.
Unfortunately, sometimes what we see in movies is another
person’s reality. After his encounter with the Italian mafia, Marco was
rewarded with his life instead of a shiny Oscar statuette.
*The real names have
been altered for security reasons.
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