Rome prosecutors arrest five Anzio police officers over drug ring collusion and stolen cocaine

The investigation and arrests

Judicial authorities in Rome executed custodial arrest warrants on 8 September 2026 against five police officers stationed at the Anzio-Nettuno commissariato on the Lazio coast. The detained officers, identified as Mauro Matalone, Antonello Pucci, Alessandro Fortunato, Sergio Forcina, and Francesco Aversano, held central positions within the station's judicial police unit, including the unit's head. The arrests followed an inquiry directed by the Rome District Anti-Mafia Directorate (DDA) and executed by the Central Operations Service investigative section (SISCO) alongside the Rome mobile squad. Rome's police chief suspended all five officers from duty after the preliminary investigations judge issued detention orders for eight people in total. The suspects were transferred to detention facilities across and outside the region to await preliminary validation hearings.

Origins of the wiretaps

The inquiry began in February 2024 during wiretaps focused on an Italian-Albanian drug trafficking network operating across the coastal municipalities of Anzio and Nettuno. Investigators intercepted a telephone conversation between international drug trafficker Giancarlo Massidda and his son Simone Massidda. Giancarlo Massidda, previously listed among Italy's most dangerous fugitives following his 2002 arrest and 2010 escape from house arrest before his 2018 capture in Buenos Aires, discussed local police conduct with his son.

They keep the drugs from the searches.

Subsequent intercepted calls revealed that local dealers frequently referred to one of the officers by the criminal moniker Il Cinghiale. Wiretapped conversations indicated that this officer stole cash and behaved outside legal protocols, prompting antimafia prosecutors to broaden surveillance on the station's judicial police unit.

Diversion of narcotics and money

Over the course of 2024 and 2025, investigators documented at least 17 separate criminal episodes involving the five officers. The group systematically withheld portions of narcotics seized during official searches rather than depositing the drugs into evidentiary custody. In two distinct property searches, the officers took a combined 20,000 euros in cash from detained suspects without logging the money in official records, using the funds to support personal spending beyond their lawful income. Furthermore, the officers managed four confidential informants by supplying them with stolen narcotics to maintain leverage. In one documented case, the officers pressured a drug dealer placed under house arrest to work for them, forcing him to distribute the skimmed cocaine.

Staged delivery and criminal charges

A key accusation involves an irregular controlled delivery and delayed seizure arranged in collaboration with members of the drug ring. The officers recorded a seizure of 25 kilograms of cocaine, worth part of an estimated 2 million euro shipment, while intentionally omitting the subsequent seizure of a full 50-kilogram batch. During that staged operation, an Albanian courier transporting the narcotics died in a road crash following a pursuit across the Anzio-Nettuno countryside.

The Rome preliminary investigations judge charged the five officers with criminal conspiracy to commit offenses against public administration, external complicity in drug trafficking, embezzlement, forgery, unlawful drug distribution, and unauthorized access to police databases. Both Anzio and Nettuno municipal councils had previously been dissolved by Italian authorities due to mafia infiltration, and the broader drug syndicate is being prosecuted under separate judicial proceedings.