Placido Rizzotto

{{Short description|Italian trade unionist}}

{{Infobox person

| name = Placido Rizzotto

| image = Placido_Rizzotto.jpg

| image_size = 150px

| image_caption =

| birth_date = {{birth date|df=y|1914|1|2}}

| birth_place = Corleone, Sicily

| death_date = {{Death date and age|df=y|1948|3|10|1914|1|2}}

| death_place = Rocca Busambra, Sicily

| disappeared_date = {{disappeared date and age|df=y|1948|3|10|1914|1|2}}

| body_discovered = 7 July 2009
Rocca Busambra

| death_cause = Murdered

| occupation =

| spouse =

| children =

}}

Placido Rizzotto ({{IPA|it|ˈplaːtʃido ritˈtsɔtto}}; 2 January 1914 – 10 March 1948) was an Italian partisan,{{Cite web|url=http://lombardia.anpi.it/voghera/rizzotto/rizzotto.htm|title=ANPI Voghera {{!}} Placido Rizzotto - Il Partigiano che morì di mafia|website=lombardia.anpi.it|access-date=2019-08-09}} socialist peasant and trade union leader from Corleone, who was kidnapped and murdered by Sicilian Mafia boss Luciano Leggio on 10 March 1948. Before he was killed, Rizzotto was engaged in activism with farm laborers, trying to help them take over unfarmed land on large estates in the area.{{cite book | last = Cockburn | first = Alexander | author-link = Alexander Cockburn |author2=Jeffrey St. Clair |author2-link=Jeffrey St. Clair | title = Whiteout, the CIA, drugs and the press | url = https://archive.org/details/whiteoutciadrugs00cock | url-access = registration | pages= [https://archive.org/details/whiteoutciadrugs00cock/page/137 137]| publisher = Verso | year= 1998 | location = New York | isbn = 1-85984-258-5 }}
- {{cite book|title=Midnight in Sicily|author=Peter Robb|year=2007|publisher=Macmillan|isbn=978-0-312-42684-2|page=104|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=FaQ7atNLeawC&pg=PA104}}
- {{cite book|title=A passion for Sicilians: the world around Danilo Dolci|author=Jerry Mangione|publisher=Transaction|year=1985|isbn=978-0-88738-606-0|page=167|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0AlM3vxXp8gC&pg=PA167}}
- {{cite book|title=The Mafia and politics, Volume 1966, Part 1|author=Michele Pantaleone|publisher=Chatto & Windus|year=1966|page=115|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=uA8ZAAAAIAAJ&q=%22Placido+Rizzotto%22+%28Union+OR+unionist+OR+socialist%29}} A 12-year-old shepherd, Giuseppe Letizia, witnessed Rizzotto's murder and was killed the following day with a lethal injection, made by Michele Navarra, a qualified physician and Mafia doctor.{{Cite web |date=2012-03-09 |title=Ritrovati i resti di Placido Rizzottosindacalista ucciso dalla mafia nel '48 |url=https://palermo.repubblica.it/cronaca/2012/03/09/news/trovate_le_ossa_di_placido_rizzotto-31212133/?ref=HREC1-5 |access-date=2025-03-18 |website=la Repubblica |language=it}} In the 1960s, Leggio was acquitted twice of Rizzotto's murder due to lack of evidence.