ROME – Police in Sicily gave a new "face" to Italy's No. 1 fugitive on Monday, issuing an updated composite of Mafia boss Bernardo Provenzano (search) in hopes of ending the Corleone (search) crime chieftain's 42 years on the run.
Authorities trying to capture Provenzano have only five photographs to go on, including two police mug shots, dating back decades when the suspect was a young man.
The computer-generated image shows the now 72-year-old mobster with receding, white hair and haggard cheeks. It was drawn up with the help of testimony from a Mafia turncoat in 2002.
Investigators have said they believe Provenzano has spent most of his years as a fugitive moving from house to house across Sicily, thanks largely to the help of Sicilians' reluctance to inform authorities.
The fugitive went to a clinic in Marseille, France, for prostate surgery (search), said investigators, who showed the new composite to clinic personnel.
"The French doctors said this face is that of the patient they examined," Palermo Prosecutor Piero Grasso said at a news conference. "The doctors said that, compared to this composite, the man was even thinner and older (looking) because he was suffering."
While at the clinic, Provenzano reportedly used the name of a 73-year-old Sicilian baker whose son was arrested earlier this year for allegedly providing protection and logistical support to the boss.
Grasso said authorities hoped distribution of the composite would spare some citizens unpleasant run-ins with the law, the Italian news agency Apcom reported.
He didn't elaborate, but he appeared to be referring to a Palermo man who was recently detained at the airport in Rome for 12 hours because authorities thought he looked like Provenzano.
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