Mafia boss wins right to use bathroom without being filmed

London, March 28 (ANI): A Mafia boss has won the right to go to the bathroom in private while behind bars.

Judge Giovanna Di Rosa accepted Salvatore Lo Piccolo's argument that he should be able to visit the lavatory without being filmed as he was "entitled to his privacy".

She added that by filming him, Lo Piccolo was being "subjected to inhuman and degrading treatment" - a decision that has outraged members of a group for victims of the Mob.

Italian law dictates that Mafia prisoners are kept under conditions defined by rule 41, ordering constant surveillance and solitary confinement and restricting privileges such as open-air time and family visits.

Lo Piccolo, 58, is currently awaiting trial in Milan's Opera jail and is alleged to have been behind the killing of several rival mobsters and lucrative drug and extortion rackets.

Known as Il Barone ('The Baron'), he is believed to have taken over the helm as the Mafia's 'Boss of Bosses' following the 2005 arrest of Bernardo Provenzano.

Judge Di Rosa said that guards could still keep an eye on Lo Piccolo through a spy hole in the toilet's door.

"We find it hard to accept the campaigning zeal of this judge towards the inhuman and degrading treatment of Salvatore Lo Piccolo," the Telegraph quoted a spokesman for the Association of Mafia Victims as saying.

He added: "What about the inhuman and degrading treatment of his victims, their families and others who have suffered at the hands of the Mafia. He is in jail to be punished and if that means being filmed so be it.

"King Louis XIV of France regularly went to the toilet in public and no-one was bothered - why is this Mafiosi being given special treatment ?" (ANI)