Vlore, Thursday, 22 December 1949
It had taken time to mature their plan to deal with the Camorra chieftain Luigi Vollaro but finally the pieces were in place. Knežević had carefully recruited a cadre of locals who were willing to take part an assault on Volarro’s headquarters; Šaranović had made several discrete border crossings to smuggle the necessary weapons into Vlore – a number of Beretta automatic carbines and pistols from the Yugoslav army’s ‘sterile’ stores. Perović had spent weeks watching the comings and goings at the former hotel.
While night might have given them cover the activities in the streets near the hotel would, they hoped, give them the element of surprise. The solemn festivities of Christmas were in full swing, and the four Yugoslav agents and the score of local recruits had marshalled themselves into a procession that would lead them past their target. Their weapons were hidden beneath the clerical mantles that proclaimed their innocence.
As they approached Knežević saw that at least two sentinels were keeping watch.
He whispered to Đureković, “They normally have more – perhaps they’re lounging indoors”.
“Just hope everyone does their part. We’re nearly there…”
Someone opened an upper window and leaned out, jeering in Italian and trying to make himself heard above the Greek chanted by the erstwhile clerics. The first was soon joined by others. Across the street Perović and several marksmen took aim. The head of the procession had just passed the entrance to the hotel and was beginning to turn the corner when Đureković gave the signal and the street erupted with gunfire.
Perović’s snipers score first, emptying the windows of the upper stories of the hotel – most of the Camorra casualties slumped back into their rooms but at least two fell to the pavement, spattering blood as they did so. Šaranović led the head of the procession in an assault on the hotel’s side entrance while Đureković and Knežević attacked the main entrance with their automatics blazing. Once inside it was total confusion. For many of the locals they had recruited threw aside their guns and resorted to their traditional daggers and short swords, which were, in such close quarters, safer and surer to use. The hotel had three floors, and it took less than three minutes to clear the first. The two upper floors took longer – here they found the women and children that Vollaro had dragooned into his service as well as the more cowardly members of the Camorra gang. The air filled with the screams of the frightened, the wounded, and the dying.
Đureković found Vollaro’s body sprawled on the floor of the upper room that served as his master suite – his head ripped open by a sniper’s bullet. Their primary mission accomplished, he blew several shrill blasts on a whistle, signalling to the assault party to begin their withdrawal before the authorities showed up.
*****
The telephone call that had summoned Raimondo d’Aquino and his detachment of Carabinieri was confusing to say the least – gun-toting churchmen attacking a hotel in the midst of a religious procession? The address of the place he recognized – it belonged to a notorious Camorraristi – but beyond that he had no idea. Nevertheless he and his troops had speedily made their way through the narrow streets of the town to arrive as the echo of gunfire was fading away.
D’Aquino carefully surveyed the wreckage of the hotel – the floors were littered with the bodies of dead Camorraristi and a few locals – the latter partially dressed as choristers. It seemed as if someone had conducted a textbook assault and made good their escape. He did not really care who had done so – ridding Vlore of the Camorra was a blessing in his eyes. D’Aquino turned to his sergeant and calmly ordered, “Round up the usual suspects.”
*****
In their safe house on the other side of the city Stjepan Đureković and his team considered the cost of their mission. Knežević and Šaranović had both taken wounds – not serious – but at least three of the locals they had recruited had died – and others were likely wounded as well. Vollaro and his gang – at least all the principal members – had been accounted for – some of the deaths were quite gristly, as the Montenegrins enforced the Lekë Dukagjinit in their own fashion. Their mission was accomplished – their job now was to avoid detection in the expected manhunt and then exfiltrate back across the border to Yugoslavia.