Omerta is a popular attitude, common in areas of southern Italy, such as Sicily, Calabria and Campania, where the criminal organizations like the MAFIA, 'Ndrangheta and Camorra are strong. Omerta implies the categorical prohibition of cooperation with state authorities or reliance on its services, even when one has been victim of a crime.Even if somebody is condemned for a crime he has not committed, he is supposed to serve the sentence without giving the police any information about the real criminal. A common definition is the "code of silence". Within mafia culture, breaking the oath of omerta is punishable by death.
A more popular and more simplified definition of the code of omerta is: "Whoever appeals to the law against his fellow man is either a fool or a coward. Whoever cannot take care of himself without police protection is both. It is as cowardly to betray an offender to justice, even though his offences be against yourself, as it is not to avenge an injury by violence. It is dastardly and contemptible in a wounded man to betray the name of his assailant, because if he recovers, he must naturally expect to take vengeance himself. A wounded man shall say to his assailant: If I live, I will kill you - If I die you are forgiven."