Man, 39, dies in Lodi hospital after cardiac arrest during carabinieri restraint

Arrival and restraint

Carabinieri were sent at about 4.30 on Sunday, 11 October, to via Vittime della Violenza, a dead-end street in a residential area south of Lodi, after several residents called 112. Residents said they were woken by a man shouting, and Adnkronos reports that he was seen climbing onto scaffolding in a visible state of agitation. Some calls described a man fleeing an attempted theft, and others described a man simply behaving aggressively. Tgcom24 and ANSA report that he had been on the perimeter wall of a villa, presumably after trying to steal, but La Stampa says no theft was later reported. According to La Stampa, two carabinieri from the Radiomobile patrol found him thrashing on the roof of a parked car, and after pulling him down they handcuffed him on the ground to restrain him.

Cardiac arrest and resuscitation

Tgcom24 says the officers first helped him down from the fence to stop him from hurting himself, but that he kept shouting and thrashing. ANSA, Tgcom24 and Fanpage report that he went into cardiac arrest while held on the ground, while Adnkronos says it was perhaps a cardiac arrest and that the autopsy will establish the cause. La Stampa reports that he lost consciousness soon after being handcuffed, and that the intervention lasted only a few minutes before carabinieri and a paramedic from the building began resuscitation. A police car with a defibrillator arrived, and La Stampa counts four officers at the scene. Il Fatto Quotidiano reports that the defibrillator was used while residents watched, and resuscitation attempts continued while an ambulance was awaited. According to Adnkronos and Il Fatto Quotidiano, the 118 crew then took him to Lodi hospital in critical condition.

Death and investigation

The 39-year-old died at Lodi hospital on the morning of Monday, 12 October, but sources differ on the interval, with Il Fatto Quotidiano giving 24 hours and Adnkronos and La Stampa about thirty hours after the intervention. The Procura di Lodi has ordered an autopsy, and the cause of death has not been established. La Stampa reports that the prosecutor's office, led by Laura Pedio, opened a file for negligent homicide against unknown persons. Prosecutors are collecting testimony from the carabinieri and residents and listening to the 112 calls, according to ANSA, Fanpage and Il Fatto Quotidiano. La Stampa says the case was assigned to the carabinieri provincial command led by colonel Emanuele Leuzzi, and that no surveillance cameras cover the street, which makes reconstruction harder. Il Fatto Quotidiano reports that he was already known to police and had reportedly had dependency problems in the past.

Background and comparisons

ANSA notes a similar case on 19 July in Bologna, where a 42-year-old Moroccan man died while being restrained face down by two policemen, allegedly during a psychiatric crisis. ANSA also cites the 2014 death of a 39-year-old man during a carabinieri arrest in Florence, a case for which the European Court of Human Rights ordered Italy to pay damages. Italian rights groups and police critics have compared these cases to the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis, ANSA reports. No cause of death has yet been published, and the autopsy and the prosecutor's reconstruction of the intervention remain pending.