“Navi could have been saved.” Fatal, for Satnam Singh, 31, those 7 kilometers in the van with his amputated arm and the serious hemorrhage in progress, to then be dumped in the middle of the road by his employer.
Antonello Lovato, 37, was arrested on a warrant from the Latina Prosecutor’s Office. The main charges? Intentional homicide and failure to provide assistance. “Based on the findings of the medical-legal report – writes investigating judge Giuseppe Molfese who signed the order for precautionary custody in prison -, the Prosecutor’s Office changed the initial criminal hypothesis (culpable homicide) and charged the crime of intentional homicide with eventual intent. The autopsy confirmed that if the Indian, who died from copious blood loss, had been promptly assisted, he would most likely have survived. At this stage, it must therefore be considered that the decision to fail to provide assistance constituted acceptance of the risk of the lethal event and constituted the cause that directly determined the death. The investigations are continuing for other related crimes, with specific regard to the verification of working conditions”.
It all happened in a few minutes, on June 17, at the Strada del Passo farm in Borgo Santa Maria, Latina. Navi, his 26-year-old wife Soni, and other day laborers were taken by a foreman to a field to harvest melons. During the afternoon, Satnam got stuck in a plastic roller pulled by a tractor: an arm was severed by the machinery, his lower limbs were seriously injured. The man, of Indian origin, immediately lost consciousness. The owner of the company, Antonello Lovato, arrived with his foreman. They loaded Navi into a van together with his wife.
“I thought they were going to take us to the hospital,” the woman explained to the police, “but instead they left us in front of our house, on Via Genova, in Castelverde. They even took our cell phones away from the van.” The amputated arm left in a vegetable crate near the garbage bins. Navi on the ground. The woman screaming but not speaking Italian. Her compatriots come to her aid and, above all, the Italian couple hosting them. The two young people, Ilario Pepe and Noemi Grifo, the superwitnesses, see the van driven by Lovato arrive, unload the 31-year-old and then flee. “Lovato only said that the worker was not in compliance and that he had cut himself while his wife screamed: Husband is breathing, I live.” The two men’s call to 118 and the helicopter transport to San Camillo in Rome, at that point, are not enough to save Satnam’s life. The doctors try the impossible but after a day and a half of agony Navi dies. Antonello Lovato, a few hours after the fact, shows up at the police station to give his version of the facts. “I was scared, I didn’t know what to do since the man had been hired illegally and didn’t have a residence permit.”
His father Renzo released a shocking statement to Tg1, sparking a wave of controversy: “He made a mistake that cost everyone dearly. My son warned him not to get too close to the vehicle, but he did what he wanted.” The 37-year-old under investigation is holed up at home. “He is shocked,” his relatives say. “I want justice for my son,” Satnam’s mother says in a video message from Northern India. “I can imagine what his wife is going through.” Satnam and Soni left their country three years ago in search of a better life. Four euros an hour, the maximum wage the two can earn by toiling for 10 hours in the fields of the area. Lovato, a sole proprietorship, usually has 4 workers, two regular employees and two illegal. Like Navi and Soni. In 2023, father Renzo Lovato was investigated with 15 other people for the crime of gangmastering as part of the Jamuna operation by the Carabinieri and the Labor Inspectorate.
In Agrilovato, an agricultural cooperative, investigators discover
living conditions comparable to slavery. Salaries of 110 euros per month to toil in any weather condition, unpaid overtime, zero security and accommodation that is nothing short of dilapidated, beyond human dignity.
