Claude Covassi

Claude Covassi (1970 – 8 February 2013) was a Swiss criminal and spy.

Biography Born in Geneva, Covassi studied philosophy in Paris, where he became close friends with Paolo Fogagnolo, a former member of the Italian Red Brigades. In the 1990s, Covassi settled on Ibiza. He was twice convicted of fraud and made a living smuggling drugs to Ibiza to supply the local party scene.

In 2003, the police of Geneva recruited Covassi as an informant because of his knowledge about European cocaine smuggling networks. They soon passed him on to the Swiss internal intelligence service, DAP, who paid Covassi to infiltrate the Centre Islamique de Genève, an Islamic religious center in Geneva, in order to determine whether the center was a haven for Islamic fundamentalists. The operation was almost aborted because Covassi was again arrested for credit card fraud, but the DAP bailed him out. In the event, Covassi reported no actionable intelligence from the center, but converted to Islam during his stay. On 8 February 2013, he was found dead, apparently as a result of a drug overdose according to initial police reports.