It is hardly likely that foxy old “Don Liborio” anticipated any such far-reaching result of his extraordinary manœuvre with the Camorra. It was not many weeks, however, before the Camorrists who had been given public office and continued under Garibaldi, began to show themselves in their true colors, and to use every opportunity for blackmail and private vengeance. They had been given charge of the octroi, or taxes levied at the city gates, and these decreased, under Salvatore di Crescenza, from forty thousand to one thousand ducats per day. Another Camorrist collector, Pasquale Menotte, had the effrontery to turn in, on one occasion, the princely sum of exactly four cents. It became absolutely necessary to get rid of them at any cost, and to drive them out of the police and army, which they now permeated. Mild measures were found insufficient, and as early as 1862 a raid was conducted by the government upon the organization—Sparenta, the Minister of Police, arresting three hundred Camorrists in one day. But he accomplished little. From this time on until 1900 the history of the Camorra is that of a corrupt political ring having a standing army of crooks and rascals by means of which to carry out its bargains.
During this period many serious attempts were made to exterminate it, but practically to no purpose. In 1863 another fruitless series of raids filled the jails of Naples, and even of Florence and Turin, with its members; but the society continued to flourish—less openly. The resignation of Nicotera as Prime Minister in 1876 was followed by a burst of activity among the Camorrists, but in 1877 the government made a serious effort to put down the Mafia in Sicily, while in 1880 the murder of Bonelli in a foul dive of the Camorra in Naples resulted in the prosecution of five Camorrists for his murder. The trial, like that of 1911‒12, took place, for reasons of safety, at Viterbo. The witnesses testified freely upon every subject save the Camorra, and could not be induced to suggest that the assassination had been the result of a conspiracy. “The word Camorra seemed to burn their tongues.” The jury were so impressed by the obvious terror which the society inspired in the Neapolitans that they found all the five—Esposito, Romano, Tiniscalchi, Langella, and Trombetta—guilty, and they were sentenced to forced labor in the galleys.