Stanley Tuki is not alone with the popular Italian cooking show, it seems.
Malia, a fugitive from the Dominican Republic, has been arrested for inadvertently commenting on her culinary hobbies to police.
Seven years after the escape, Mark Farren Claude Byart was started with his wife through the YouTube cooking channel, Italian police said in a statement.
Police said the alleged gangster had a “love of Italian cuisine” – and tattoo ink made his arrest possible, police said.
Although he carefully hid his face, Beart failed to disguise his distinctive body tattoos, they added.
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Police say they believe Bayert is a member of the infamous Nadrangeta Crime Syndicate – one of Europe’s most feared and powerful – from the Calabria region on the toe of the shoe-shaped peninsula in southern Italy.
He has been accused of smuggling cocaine from the Netherlands since 2014, police said.
Biart, 53, has lived in the Dominican Republic for the past five years and police say he maintains a low profile during his stay in the Caribbean – in addition to cooking videos posted on the Internet.
He was known simply as “Mark” to the locals and kept his distance from the Italian community in the popular tourist destination.
Reggio-Cala Liberia police officer Lt. Col. Massimiliano Gallaso told NBC News that authorities have never stopped searching for Biart and have recently turned to open source intelligence.
Armed with the knowledge of his wife’s YouTube activity and the knowledge that the fugitives had previously worked in an Italian restaurant, Glasso said police found cooking videos and realized they had a man.
His arrest was discovered last week in the Dominican city of Boca Chika, after which he was extradited to Italy and arrived in Milan on Monday.
The channel was launched earlier this year, but is no longer active, Glasso said, as Beart is in custody.
Bairt’s arrest is a breakthrough in an international effort led by Interpol and multiple European police forces to reduce organized crime. The initiative, launched last year, known as ‘Andrengeta v. Interpol Cooperation’, has been tasked with disrupting the global network of mafia gangs, which Interpol says “are on every continent.”
Another “Nadrangeta Mafia member” was arrested in Portugal on Monday, police said. Francesco Pel, who had been on the run for 14 years, was found in a clinic in Lisbon where he was receiving treatment for Covid-19.
Pel is accused of ordering the killing of a rival clan boss who survived the attack but whose wife died in a surprise attack.
The mafia group is currently involved in Italy’s largest mob tests in the last three decades. It took more than three hours to read the names of 350 defendants during the pre-hearing of the landmark case.
Expected for at least a year, the case brings charges of kidnapping, murder and international drug trafficking.
Italian officials said the arrests, like those of Beart and Pel, prove the activities of the mafia are a threat not only to Italy, but to the whole world.
