A crime as heinous as it is disconcerting in terms of methods and context. The news of the murder of a 17 year old is heartbreaking Pescara in the nightmare. The city has not yet gotten over the shock of the ambush at the Bar del Parco in the residential neighborhood of Pescara-bene. It was August 1, 2022 when two people, the architect Walter Albi and Luca Cavallito, were the targets of eight gunshots fired by a killer. It was time for the evening aperitif and panic broke out among the people. Albi was killed and Cavallito miraculously survived a series of surgeries on his face too. History of drugs, we will later learn, history of betrayed agreements with organized crime which in Pescara knows how to camouflage itself well by remaining under the radar, but also knows how to come out into the open to raise its voice when there is a mistake to be punished. And it is most likely a mistake also in the case of the killing of the very young man stabbed on Sunday evening in Baden Powell Park. Same context, a green area surrounded by the elegant buildings of the city’s bourgeoisie. In the square in front used as a car park, the complex is called Parco dei Musici and the names on the bells are those of lawyers, entrepreneurs, journalists, traders and professionals. Tenants distracted by daily activities, but not to the point of keeping their eyes closed. “For some time we had reported the presence of a small group of young drug dealers near the park but no one has yet intervened” commented a resident, informed of the tragic event the other evening upon returning home with his family. “I have a 15-year-old son, the age of the victim, it’s absurd to hear such news” said a young mother with tears in her eyes of shock.
Pescara, killed at 17 and thrown into a park: two minors taken (one is the son of a local carabinieri commander, the other of a well-known lawyer)
Mayor Carlo Masci was dismayed when he announced a comment on the tragic event to be delivered to the agencies.
What scares and worries the people of Pescara is the young age of the victim but also of his alleged murderers: two peers are in custody at the police station. They were the ones who hit the victim, an Italian boy of Albanian origins, with a knife. And the knife is a recurring element that forcefully comes back to the foreground, that is, the use of edged weapons has become strangely common among boys, even from good families, as in the case of the two arrested for this murder. The news has been reporting on the disturbing phenomenon for some time: several cases of stabbings have occurred in Pescara in recent weeks, attacks and violence involving young people accustomed to moving in packs but not necessarily definable as baby gangs. These are mostly groups led by a single person, young people who force each other and who do not hesitate to attack even for the most banal reasons, such as being denied entry to a club on the Riviera or for a equivocal look towards a little girl.
A context that finds no boundaries in the suburban neighborhoods but asserts itself right in the center, on the seafront among the luxury residential complexes of penthouses for sale for two million. But Pescara is also a city where the boundaries between the central shopping streets and the gray areas where anything can happen are truly blurred. All it takes is an alley parallel to the most elegant streets to find yourself in a casbah where the signs of the “bangla” or Chinese clubs dominate, where the customers close themselves in almost as if they want to seek shelter, a refuge away from prying eyes. And then there is the resulting area, the large square with the central car park in front of the station which, especially at night, but not only, becomes the scene of threats, robberies and attacks. A place that represents the first postcard of the city to those leaving the station, but which on the contrary reveals the most disturbing face of him, a place where a stab can get you even for a coin denied to a drifter or a drug addict. Or even for a mistake between small-time drug dealers as in the case of the 17-year-old killed in the park. Overall elegant just 200 meters from the station.
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