Who is Marc Feren Claude Biart? Mafia fugitive caught after he reveals identifying tattoos in YouTube videos
Authorities have finally arrested Marc Feren Claude Biart, a former member of the Italian mob, after years on the lam because he forgot to hide his unmistakable tattoos in cooking videos on YouTube.
Biart, 53, was evading Italian authorities for alleged drug trafficking, but was tracked down and apprehended in the Dominican Republic on Wednesday, March 24, according to a Fox News report.
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Who is Marc Feren Claude Biart?
Biart was reportedly a member of the Cacciola clan of the ’Ndrangheta -- an organized crime syndicate based out of Italy's Calabria region and arguably the country's most powerful outfit, ahead of Sicily-based Cosa Nostra and the Campania-based Camorra.
Biart eluded capture in 2014, when Italian prosecutors ordered his arrest over an alleged cocaine trafficking operation in the Netherlands, according to The Guardian.
#Video- 'Ndrangheta: #Estradato da Santo Domingo il #Latitante Marc Feren Claude Biart - https://t.co/FZszHjRts3#Arrestato #MarcFerenClaudeBiart #SantoDomingo #Calabria #Cronaca pic.twitter.com/VMpxRnGq6t
— calabrianews (@calabrianewsit) March 29, 2021
The former ’Ndrangheta member had somehow made it to the Dominican Republic and was maintaining a low profile. However, police noted that Biart and his spouse were considered "foreigners" by other ex-pats in the region, per Calabria News. Biart was himself a "ghost" known only as Marc. However, the couple eventually blew their cover due to their mutual love of Italian cooking, which apparently wasn't a secret.
In a statement to the Guardian, authorities said that Biart was careful to leave his face out of any cooking videos. However, he forgot to cover the rest of his person despite having distinctive tattoos that made it easy for authorities to identify him from YouTube clips. What those tattoos exactly were wasn't clear at the time of writing.
The tracing of Biart's whereabouts and his subsequent arrest came after a combined effort that included the Central Criminal Police Directorate, Interpol, and multiple police forces from 10 countries.
Speaking to Calabria News, authorities revealed that Biart was hiding out in a tourist resort in the Dominican Republic which had a large Italian community. He had been in the country for more than five years at the time of his arrest.
Prior to making a home in Boca Chica, Biart was allegedly staying in Costa Rica, which is at least 1,800 miles away. In 2014, Biart was subjected to an order of custody in prison by the Court of Reggio Calabria. He fled the country soon after the court decision.
According to the Guardian, a number of reputed ’Ndrangheta mobsters have been apprehended of late, including the notorious former Pelle ‘ndrina clan member Francesco Pelle, who was nabbed in Portugal on Monday.
Pelle evaded the police for 14 years and was reportedly involved in a feud between the Pelle-Romeo and Nirta-Strangio gangs, which in 2007 resulted in the deaths of six men who were killed outside an Italian restaurant in the western German city of Duisberg.
Authorities have accused Pelle of a failed assassination plot against rival mobster Giovanni Nirta, during which his spouse Maria Strangio was killed and four others were injured, the Guardian reported.