Video After The Jump
(Reuters) Two American tourists were sentenced to life in prison by an Italian court on Wednesday for the 2019 murder of a policeman near their Rome hotel in a case that shook the nation.
Finnegan Lee Elder, who was 19 at the time, had admitted to stabbing Mario Cerciello Rega in the early hours of July 26, 2019, while his friend Gabriel Christian Natale-Hjorth, then 18, was tussling with another police officer.
However, the pair say they had acted in self defense because they thought the two policemen, who were not in uniform at the time, were thugs out to get them after a botched attempt to buy drugs.
The court rejected their testimony & handed down the toughest punishment possible in Italy. Under Italy's penal code, criminals serving life terms can be eligible for parole after 21 years, if they have a good behavior record.
The two Americans, who come from California, were also found guilty of attempted extortion, assault, resisting a public official & carrying an attack-style knife without just cause.
The pair were quickly led out as soon as the sentence was delivered. Cerciello Rega's widow, clutching a photograph of her dead husband, was in the courtroom & sobbed after the verdict was announced.
Elder & Natale-Hjorth had come to Rome on holiday & tried to buy drugs from a local dealer in a tourist hotspot. They told the court that they were cheated, but managed to snatch a bag off an intermediary as he tried to get away.
They subsequently agreed to meet the dealer again to get their money back in exchange for the bag, but instead the two policemen showed up. Elder testified that the pair attacked them, forcing him & Natale-Hjorth to defend themselves.
The second policeman, Andrea Varriale, denied this & said they clearly identified themselves. He hugged his slain partner's widow following the verdict.
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