Mobster’s tattoos end up a giveaway

Marc Feren Claude Biart was always careful to hide his face in his Italian cooking tutorials, filming the Youtube videos while lying low from police on a sandy beach in the Caribbean.

But Biart, an alleged member of southern Italy’s powerful ’Ndrangheta crime syndicate, had failed to obscure his tattoos on tape — a clue authorities now say they used to track down the mobster in the Dominican Republic.

Biart, 53, was arrested recently at Milan’s Malpensa airport after arriving on a flight from Santo Domingo, according to the Italian state broadcaster Rai, the latest episode in a sprawling, international effort to fight the ’Ndrangheta.

According to a Rai report shared by Italy’s Interior Ministry, law enforcement authorities had ordered Biart’s arrest in 2014 for criminal drug trafficking on behalf of the ’Ndrangheta’s Cacciola clan.

Biart fled to Costa Rica and then more than five years ago to Boca Chica, a beach town in the Dominican Republic known for its white sand and clear blue waters, police said. Although the town is a popular destination for Italian tourists, Biart and his wife kept his distance from their countrymen.

In their free time, however, they appeared to have uploaded several cooking tutorials for Italian recipes to Youtube, including ones where Biart’s tattoos were visible.

It is unclear if he has retained a lawyer or if his videos are still online. He could not immediately be reached for comment by The Washington Post.