later his first son Vincenzo was born. Best man at the baptism was fellow mafioso Calogero Vizzini who would also be the witness at the marriage of Vincenzo in 1950 together with Rosario Lanza, the president of the Sicilian regional assembly. Until 1934 Genco Russo officially held no significant land holdings. As caretaker and lease-holder (gabelotto or bailiff) he controlled part of an estate and was an associate in a cooperative that controlled another. As associate of a cooperative of ex-combatants he also had a share in the Polizzello estate. He ruled the cooperative through intimidation and threats, while at the same time he kept working as labourer on the fields. Arrests and acquittals During Fascist rule, when the authorities embarked on a campaign against the Mafia, Genco Russo was arrested repeatedly on charges ranging from theft and extortion to membership in a criminal association, and 11 murders and several attempted murders, but with one exception, regularly acquitted on grounds of "insufficient evidence" (the mark of a successful mafioso showing his power to intimidate potential witnesses and enforce the law of silence – omertà). Nevertheless, in 1929 the fascist prefect Cesare Mori arrested him with 331 other mafiosi during a massive raid. In 1928 he had been acquitted for lack of evidence by the prosecution of four murders, robberies and extortion and a year before, in 1927, he had been acquitted of criminal conspiracy. He was sentenced to seven years in prison for criminal association, later reduced to three years, and submitted to special surveillance between 1934–1938. In 1944 the court granted Genco Russo a decree of rehabilitation for his one conviction, thereby allowing him "to recreate a moral and social virginity, acquiring a respectability which will permit him to undertake even political activity." From man of honour to man of order From this time on, Genco Russo was to face no more criminal charges. Police files described him as a "man of order". Once established, the mafioso Genco Russo changed his original behaviour as "man of honour", to become a "man of order", inserting himself in public life and looking for a political position. His integration into the official power elite proceeded rapidly. After World War II, Genco Russo managed to control two large estates, one being the Polizzello estate where he once herded the goats. The princes of Lanza Branciforti di Trabia, made him gabelotto (bailiff) of the