Caivano employer under house arrest over worker's fatal fall; Cuneo farm strike called

Employer placed under house arrest

Carabinieri from the Caivano station, supported by the local company, carried out a custody order against the employer of Salvatore Calignano, a 37-year-old man living in Caivano who is now under house arrest with an electronic bracelet. The order was issued by the preliminary investigations judge (GIP) of the Naples North court at the request of the prosecutor's office. The employer faces charges of manslaughter aggravated by the violation of safety rules and wilful omission of precautions against workplace injuries. The person who commissioned the work and the owner of the warehouse are also under investigation for manslaughter in cooperation. The prosecutor's office established that Calignano and the two other workers on the site were all employed off the books.

How the fall was reconstructed

Investigators built the sequence from video surveillance footage and from witnesses who, after initial reluctance, gave decisive information. The footage showed Calignano working on the warehouse roof with the two other men, with no protective equipment or safety measures for work at height. The employer was on site at the time of the fall. A few hours after the accident, he formally registered Calignano's hiring with effect from the previous day, in an attempt to simulate a regular contract. GPS data from the ambulances and the 118 call records matched the rescue site with the fall site, which ruled out early suggestions that the body had been moved or that help had been withheld. Bystanders who were not involved had called 118 and waited for the ambulance.

From the fall to the autopsy

Calignano, 61, was found gravely injured by the 118 emergency service on Friday 2 October on an isolated road, Via Fosso del Lupo, after a call for help. He told his wife by phone that afternoon that he was working on a warehouse roof, and before losing consciousness he told medics he had fallen from a ladder. He died on the morning of 3 October at the San Giuliano hospital in Giugliano in Campania, where he had arrived the day before in critical condition. The autopsy on 8 October was attended by a consultant appointed by the family's lawyer, Francesco Petruzzi, who described the findings:

Fractures to the sternum, pelvis, wrist and sacrum have emerged, consistent with a fall from a considerable height, of at least 8 metres, which certainly would not have allowed him to walk on his own.

Checks showed that Calignano had received unemployment benefit in September and had been regularised a few days before the accident, a circumstance that raised doubts for the family's lawyer. Prosecutor Sabrina Navarro of the Naples North prosecutor's office leads the investigation, and a new charge against the employer was added on 8 October. Forensic copies of the seized phones are to be commissioned on Thursday 15 October. The funeral is scheduled for 17:30 on 9 October at the San Massimo church in Orta di Atella, where he lived with his family.

Cuneo unions call a farm strike

Separately, Keita M., a 38-year-old farm worker from Mali, was struck by a vehicle on Thursday morning in Scarnafigi, in the province of Cuneo, while cycling to work on Provincial Road 133. Authorities are investigating the circumstances. The provincial branches of Fai Cisl, Flai Cgil and Uila Uil called a strike of all agricultural workers in the province for the whole of Monday 12 October, with a protest rally held at the same time outside the Cuneo Prefecture. The unions rejected the idea that the death was a freak accident and said:

We are witnessing yet another violent death of a worker in the Saluzzo fruit-growing district.

The unions count this as the fifth fatality in the province in three months, following a Pakistani worker who was hit by a car that did not stop in Lagnasco a few weeks earlier. They argue that the fruit and vegetable harvesting system is pushing its logistical costs onto workers' lives and safety. On Friday, a 62-year-old man also died near Bergamo after being crushed by a mini-excavator.