It was a crime that made no sense. Investigators were at a loss to explain the bloody killings of 45-year-old Susy De Nardo and her 12-year-old son, Gianluca, hacked to death in their own home in a residential suburb in the northern Italian town of Novi Ligure. Susy's body was found in the kitchen and that of little Gianluca in the bathtub. The house bore the signs of a violent struggle while the two bodies bore the marks of no less than 97 stabbings with what appeared to be a kitchen knife. In particular, Gianluca's killing appeared to have been especially violent since not only had he been stabbed 57 times but he had also been drowned in the bathtub.
However, there had been a witness to the killing, which took place at around 9 p.m. on Wednesday night of last week. The witness was Erika, Gianluca's 16-yearold sister, who had been in the house at the time of the double murder but had escaped. She was the only other family member in the house at the time since her father, Francesco De Nardo, had gone out for his weekly game of five-a-side soccer. The De Nardos had only two children, Erika and Gianluca.
Erika later told investigators that she had been listening to music on headphones in her bedroom upstairs when she heard Gianluca cry for help. At that point, she rushed out of her room to be confronted on the upstairs landing with the terrifying sight of her already wounded mother struggling with two men. Her mother screamed at her to "run for it" and she did just that, leaving the house via the underground garage and then raising the alarm by stopping a passing motorist.
That night, in the police station, Erika claimed that the killing had been carried out by "extra-communitari", i.e. non-EU foreigners. She thought they might have been Albanian and when shown police file photos of Albanians with known criminal records, she unhesitatingly and repeatedly pointed to the same man as one of the two killers.
News of the killing spread quickly, both locally and nationally. Neighbours gathered outside the De Nardo home to scream abuse at the investigating carabinieri, arguing that they had been abandoned in the face of a growing climate of micro-criminality linked to the prostitution and drug rackets run by East European clans in the area.
Novi Ligure is a dormitory town, right in the centre of a large triangle formed by Turin to the north-west, Milan to the north-east and Genoa to the south. Until last week, it was best known as the town from which legendary post-war cyclist Fausto Coppi hailed. These days, after darkness, the roads leading out of Novi Ligure are peopled with prostitutes, mainly from Eastern Europe and apparently doing a brisk trade.
Nor were the De Nardo neighbours the only ones to vent their anger. Deputy Giampaolo Landi, of ex-Fascist Alleanza Nazionale, spoke of how the criminal activities of illegal immigrants were now "terrorising the nation". The local branch of the Federalist Northern League made plans to hold a protest march against the "criminal bands" that had "taken over entire hinterlands", while one police trade union, Lisipo, issued a call for the re-introduction of the death penalty.
In the midst of this hysterical climate, the public prosecutor, Carlo Carlesi, kept his cool. He and senior police officers remained puzzled. Too many ends did not tie up. Why had nothing been stolen from the house? How come there was no sign of a break-in? Why had the burglars - if they were burglars - shown such ferocity? Why had the family dogs, Snoopy and Bobo, not barked? Why had Erika left the house via the underground garage rather than straight out the front door? Why had it taken Erika up to half an hour to raise the alarm? How come the girl did not seem upset or disturbed but rather remained calm and in control of herself?
Subsequent investigative work confirmed all the worst suspicions of prosecutor Carlesi. For a start, the Albanian picked out by Erika had a cast-iron alibi. For a second, forensic evidence showed that she had walked out of the house rather than run and that she had not, as claimed, been barefoot.
His suspicions confirmed, the public prosecutor asked for surveillance of Erika's phone calls. On Thursday night, 24 hours after the murders, investigators heard Erika talking to her 17-year-old boyfriend, Mauro "Omar" Fasaro on her mobile: "Don't worry, they'll never find us out because I'm the only witness".
Next day, the prosecutor summoned both Erika and Omar for further questioning. For long periods on that Friday afternoon, he left the two alone in an interrogation room. Unknown to Erika and Omar, everything they said and did was being filmed and recorded: "How many times did you stick it into him? . . . Don't worry, you won't go to prison. I'm the only witness and they can't do anything to us. All you've got to do is say that you weren't there, that's all", said Erika.
"Yeah, and you stick to your story, keep repeating that it was Albanians who did it . . . " replied Omar.
By late Friday night, both Erika and Mauro had been arrested on homicide charges. Since then, the two have accused one another of being the real instigator of the crime, each arguing that they acted under the dominating influence of the other. Omar even claimed this week that Erika had also wanted to wait in the family home and kill her father when he returned from his football game.
AT the moment, both are housed in the Ferrante Aporti Minors Prison in Turin, lodged on different floors. The investigation into the case is still ongoing since investigators believe that neither Erika nor Omar has told the whole truth. If and when their case eventually comes to court, they will be tried according to that section of the penal code applicable to juveniles and minors. In theory, they could face a sentence of up to 21 years. In practice, it may well be rather shorter.
Visited by parliamentarians in prison this week, Erika appeared in good spirits, telling her visitors that "life is long" and that prison life is a bit like being in boarding school. In the cell next to her is a girl called Ambra, one of three 17-year-olds who last June murdered the 61-year-old nun, Sister Maria Laura Mainetti, in a horrendous Satanic rite killing in the little Alpine town of Chiavenna, on the Italo-Swiss border.
While Francesco De Nardo deals with his horrendous grief, the rest of Italy looks on and wonders what has gone wrong with the mobile-phone addicted generation of Real Slim Shady Italian youth. Erika and Omar both come from comfortable middle-class families. Both seemed to be likeable, well-adjusted youngsters. Neither of them gave any trouble at school. Teachers and friends alike can point to no incident or trauma that could explain their horrendously violent behaviour. Is the key to their crime to be found in the very banal "normality" of their life? Is it a case of endemic small town boredom-cum-alienation transformed into sheer malice, of Greek trajedy dimensions? Who knows? Perhaps, however, the Cardinal of Turin, Ersilio Tonini, had a point when he commented last weekend: "Omar and Erika are more dead than their victims".
