Ricin poisoning deaths in Molise: police inspect school computers for poison-related web searches
Italian investigators are searching school computers for ricin-related web queries made before a mother and her 15-year-old daughter died of poisoning in Pietracatella in late December 2025.
Deaths and the inquiry
A mother and her 15-year-old daughter died of ricin poisoning in Pietracatella, a town in the Campobasso area of Molise, between 27 and 28 December 2025. According to Open, both died about 48 hours after the mother was admitted to hospital. The Larino prosecutor's office ordered the searches, and prosecutor Elvira Antonelli is leading the inquiry, which is run by the Squadra Mobile of Campobasso and the Sco. The family had been living in a home that was seized, and a relative who teaches at a liceo in Casacalenda had hosted the husband and the surviving daughter for several months in Pietracatella.
Searches traced on the web
Investigators are examining traces left by two anonymous users on the American forum platform Rabbit between August 2025 and January 2026, according to Open. One of them posed as a novelist for five months to ask how a fictional character could be poisoned with ricin. After the deaths, the questions changed. On 5 January 2026 the user asked how long ricin stays in the blood and whether an autopsy could detect it, questions that investigators say only make sense once the deaths had occurred. Open reports that this shift came during eleven days of silence that overlapped with the victims' final days. Tgcom separately reports that an anonymous Reddit user had earlier asked how to obtain ricin and whether it could be recognised by taste.
- Two anonymous users begin posting on the Rabbit forum, one posing as a novelist asking about ricin
- Mother and 15-year-old daughter die of ricin poisoning between 27 and 28 December
- Forum questions shift to whether ricin stays in the blood and can be detected in an autopsy
- A journalist first identifies the online chats
- Search decree for school computers follows the forum's reply on account IP addresses
- Computer inspections begin at schools in Riccia and Campobasso
The IP address lead
The online chats were first identified in May by a journalist working for the broadcaster Canale 122-Fatti di nera, but the procedural step came only at the end of September, with the search decree for the schools. The forum's reply to investigators is the key. Rabbit deletes IP addresses automatically after 100 days but keeps the address used when an account was created. According to unofficial reports, that address is compatible with the Campobasso area.
Schools and computers
The inspections are IT checks of browsing histories for specific keywords, including ricin, poison, castor seeds, castor oil, ammonium sulphate, sodium sulphate, hexane, and deep web and dark web, along with their spelling variants. Il Messaggero and Rai describe four schools, while Open reports 155 computers in three schools between Riccia and Campobasso. The schools include the agricultural institute in Riccia, where a lab technician was questioned as a witness earlier in the inquiry, and the scientific lyceum in Riccia, where his wife, a teacher, was questioned in a cross-check with the husband. The classical lyceum in Campobasso, which both the dead girl and her surviving sister attended, is scheduled for Thursday, 15 October. Il Messaggero says the Casacalenda search, the last one, is set for Friday, 16 October at 9 am.
