Rita Atria

"Before fighting the Mafia you must first examine your own conscience, after overcoming the Mafia inside yourself you can fight the Mafia that is amongst your friends, the Mafia is us and our mistaken way of behaving.

Borsellino, you died for what you believed in, but without you I am dead."

Rita Atria ( born in Partanna, 4 September 1974, died in Rome, 26 July 1992) was a witness in a major Mafia trial in Rome.

Rita Atria was born into a Mafia family and at age eleven she lost her father, Vito, who was murdered by the Mafia. He was a Mafioso of the Partanna family. These were the years in which the Corleone Mafiosi rose to prominence and of the Mafia war marked by bloody murders among rival clans fighting for supremacy.

After her father's death Rita became closer to her brother, Nicola, and to his wife, Piera Aiello. Since her brother was also a Mafioso, Rita ws privy to detailed information on the doings of the Mafia in Partanna. In June 1991 Nicola Atria was killed by the Mafia, and his wife decided to collaborate with the law.

Only 17 years of age, Rita Atria, decided in November 1991, to follow in her sister-in-law's footsteps, hoping to obtain justice for these murders from the legal system. The first person to receive her testimony was Paolo Borsellino, to whom she bonded as to a father. The evidence given by Rita and Piera, together with other testimony, led to the arrest of various Mafiosi and to the launch pf an enquiry into the politician Vincenzino Culicchia, who had been mayor of Partanna for thirty years.

A week after the bomb that killed Borsellino she committed suicide in Rome, where she had been living in a safe house.

Many people regard Rita Atria as a heroine because of her willingness to sacrifice everything, including the affection of her mother (who repudiated her and who after her death destroyed her tombstone with a hammer) in order to pursue an ideal of justice by means of an inner growth that took her from the desire for revenge to a desire for true justice. Like Piera, Rita was not a Mafia penintent, as she had not committed any crimes to repent. Because of this her collaboration assumes a higher value and she is correctly referred to as a "witness for justice", a title that has been legally recognised in Italy by the law of 13/2/2001 n. 45.

In 2007 Veronica A'Agostino played Rita in the film "The Sicilian Girl" ("La siciliana ribelle") by the director Marco Amenta.