» You are in Parallel inquiries / 20 July 2001: Piazza Alimonda, 5.27pm

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BRIEF CHRONOLOGY OF EVENTS ON FRIDAY 20 JULY

Friday 20 July
Deputy Prime Minister Gianfranco Fini, along with another MP (Ascierto) and other Alleanza Nazionale leaders, visit the carabinieri command centre in San Giuliano for several hours. Police forces are stationed in the areas along march routes and near the "thematic squares" which had been announced by the Genoa Social Forum.
Rubbish bins had been removed along march routes, but many large "wheely bins" were left along march routes and in the squares where demonstrators would gather.
The Black Block appears in the morning: groups of 10-20 people, many of whom don't speak Italian, and who move through the city smashing windows and burning wheely bins, cars and motor bikes.
They are are armed with iron bars, sticks and stones.
Many residents report what happens to the authorities. One group assembles in Piazza Paolo da Novi, the "thematic square" organised by the Cobas trade union grouping, and start to pull up the paving stones, which they place in rubbish bins.
Some demonstrators try to stop them, but the police, who were very close by, don't intervene.
Instead they retreat, firing tear gas. Although they do chase them along nearby streets, they don't really try to stop them.
(Some footage, also from Saturday, shows individuals who are first seen talking with the police, who then move towards the Black Block. Other footage shows people on mopeds who first talk with the Black Block ,then the police, and so on).
The Black Block go through the Corso Torino railway tunnel, and then split into two: one moves towards the prison, while the other goes up the Montaldo steps towards Piazza Manin.
At 3pm video footage shows some carabinieri vehicles in the square in front of the prison, along with groups of police on foot.
A 20 strong group of Black Block moves towards the jail throwing stones, and the carabinieri withdraw.
The Black Block then break some windows in the jail, and set light to a door and a window before moving off without being disturbed.
At the same time the march of the "disobedients" had left Carlini stadium, and "armed" with plexiglass shields and padding made out of polystyrene and plastic bottles, was slowly moving along its agreed route, encountering on its way overturned wheely bins and burnt-out cars.
Halfway along Via Tolemaide it was suddenly and violently attacked by carabinieri, backed up by four armoured vehicles. It is important to remember that the disobedients' spokespersons had agreed with police headquarters that their route went as far as Piazza Verdi (the square in front of Brignole station). Therefore they still had about 500 metres to go, and the red zone - protected by fencing - was even further away.
The attack drives the march back a few metres, and demonstrators regrouped along Corso Gastaldi. There are no escape routes: behind them are 10.000 people moving forward, who don't understand what is happening. On one side of the road is a four metre high wall along the top of which runs the railway line, and on the other side an unbroken series of apartment blocks.
In the mean time the Black Block who had gone up to Piazza Manin, where groups such as Pax Christi, Mani Tese and the Lilliput Network had assembled, moved on without being disturbed to Piazza Marsala. But the police moved in behind them, firing tear gas and charging into these groups of pacifists many of whom had their hands - painted in white - raised in the air. Most of those beaten and injured were women.
Returning to Via Tolemaide - after every attack against the disobedients' march, the police and their vehicles retreat, withdrawing back to the corner of Corso Torino. Some men from the march follow them, throwing stones and trying to break the windows of police vehicles.
The equivalent of a police transit, after having driven up and down at high speed - almost running over several demonstrators - gets entangled with a large wheely bin. The driver then runs away, leaving other offices inside, but the carabinieri officers positioned slightly further forward don't intervene to help their fellow officers. Visibly enraged demonstrators then attack the vehicle with iron bars and stones, but allow the carabinieri to leave the vehicle before setting it alight.
The police then drive demonstrators back along Via Tolemaide.
Carlo joined the disobedients' march at about 4.30pm, he was wearing a blue track suit bottom, a white vest and a grey track suit top wrapped around his waist. Worn down by repeated attacks, suffering from the effects of tear gas and pepper spray, as they were unable to move forward people started to move down side streets and go back towards the Carlini stadium.
This was when police and carabinieri attacked the front of the march again; driving jeeps into the crowd at 40mph, using tear gas, pepper spray, Tonfa truncheons and firing live rounds of ammunition. Demonstrators responded by hurling back some tear gas canisters, throwing stones, and erecting little barricades of large wheely bins.
Carlo finds a blue balaclava and puts it on.
There are two narrow streets running off Via Tolemaide, which lead to Piazza Alimonda.
5.15pm: a group of 20 carabinieri, supported by two Land Rovers, take up position in one of these streets and fire tear gas into the midst of the march.
Demonsrators react, and the carabinieri suddenly start to retreat, and then run away in a disorderly fashion towards Via Caffa, crossing Piazza Alimonda.
The two Land Rovers follow in reverse gear, negotiating the first large wheely bin left in the middle of the street, in front of the church.
One Land Rover, finding a bit of space, manages to move off and reach the group on foot in Via Caffa, while the other pulls up against a large rubbish bin on the right of the road.
A group of police, with jeeps and armoured vehicles, is in Via Caffa, just a few metres from this Land Rover. A much larger contingent of police and armoured vehicles is in Piazza Tommaseo, the square where the 300 metres of Via Caffa come to an end.
When demonstrators catch up with the Land Rover which had stopped in Piazza Alimonda, some of them go back towards Via Tolemaide, some start throwing stones at the police in Via Caffa, while others throw stones at the Land Rover and start attacking it with large pieces of wood.
Somebody picks up a fire extinguisher, which suddenly appeared along the side of the Land Rover, and from a close distance throws it against the back window.
It comes to rest on the spare wheel, then a boot appears from the window, kicking it down to the ground.
At this point there are four photographers and five demonstrators surrounding the vehicle. A pistol emerges from the rear window.
A young man wearing a grey sweatshirt sees the pistol, ducks, and then runs away.
Carlo moves closer, bends down to pick the fire extinguisher up, and stands up virtually facing the back of the Land Rover...
... He raises it over his head...



At this moment Carlo is 3.37 metres away from the back window of the vehicle.
It's 5.27pm.
The first shot is fired.
Pulled by the weight of the fire extinguisher, Carlo falls face down, and then rolls onto his right-hand side, towards the Land Rover.
The demonstrators in the square start to run away quickly as a second shot is heard.
The reversing lights of the Land Rover are illuminated, while some demonstrators shout at it to "stop". It first reverses over Carlo's pelvis, and then drives over his legs in first gear.
It takes five seconds from the second shot for the vehicle to move behind the police line in Via Caffa.
Carlo is dying, and the journalists who were near the Land Rover move closer to take photographs.
Some demonstrators try to stop the blood pumping out of his left cheekbone.
At this point the police move forward firing tear gas, driving away the few demonstrators left in the square.
The police surround Carlo's body.
Ten minutes later, a Genoa Social Forum para-medic who examines Carlo notices that his heart is still beating. A second para-medic arrives.
They remove his balaclava and notice a large and deep abrasion on his forehead: i.e. an injury he had suffered after being shot. There are other grazes on the right-hand side of his head.
More than one eyewitness has said that they saw policemen kicking Carlo in the head before the Genoa Social Forum para-medics arrived.

In its report for the first half of 2002, the Italian secret service admitted: "during the anti-G8 demonstrations in Genoa, the Black Block was infiltrated by elements of the extreme right".

Everything written here can be seen in the many videos listed in the "Bibliography" page of this website, and in the many photographs in the "Contro-inchieste" section. contro-inchieste.
The Black Block, and their attack on the prison, can best be seen in Davide Ferrario's "Le strade di Genova".