Former Br member Leonardo Bertulazzi has absconded from house arrest in Argentina; a manhunt is under way

Leonardo Bertulazzi, a 74-year-old former Red Brigades terrorist, has absconded from house arrest in Buenos Aires. Following his escape, which was reported by his lawyer, the Directorate-General for Criminal Intelligence issued an urgent alert to track him down immediately. Bertulazzi had been under house arrest in a flat in the centre of Buenos Aires. Following the revocation of his refugee status, he managed to evade the authorities and flee, immediately triggering a nationwide manhunt.

Another factor that may have persuaded the former Red Brigade member to flee whilst under arrest could have been the recent decision by the Argentine courts to reject the latest appeal against extradition lodged by his lawyer, Rodolfo Yanzon. Bertulazzi was therefore awaiting transfer to Italia, with Interpol already ready to take him into custody. Bertulazzi had been definitively sentenced to 27 years’ imprisonment for the kidnapping of the industrialist Pietro Costa and for membership of an armed gang.

A fugitive since 1980, Bertulazzi was arrested in Argentina in August 2024, after 44 years on the run. That same year, he had been granted refugee status by the Argentine authorities, which was revoked shortly before his arrest. Released from prison in November 2024, the Argentine Supreme Court approved his extradition to Italia on 1 July 2025. The former member of the Red Brigades had already been arrested in 2002 by the Buenos Aires police following a complex investigation carried out by officers from the Central Directorate of Preventive Police, together with officers from the Digos in Genoa and Interpol, but he was subsequently released a few months later, as the country does not permit extradition in cases where a defendant has been convicted in absentia.

Bertulazzi is the son of an army sergeant. Having moved with his family to Genoa from the Veneto region in the early 1960s, he became involved in politics whilst at the Fermi Scientific High School in Sampierdarena. He then enrolled in the Faculty of Arts, joined Lotta Continua, and eventually decided to join the Red Brigades – specifically the Genoa column – under the nom de guerre ‘Stefano’. Among other things, Bertulazzi – alongside Mario Moretti and Riccardo Dura from Genoa – was one of those involved in the kidnapping of naval engineer Piero Costa on 12 January 1977 in Genoa; he was released after 81 days in captivity. The kidnapping served as a means of self-financing: fifty million lire were used to purchase the flat at 8 Via Montalcini in Rome, where Aldo Moro was held captive.