Justice

Garlasco: investigation closed; Sempio’s shoe matches the footprint

The Pavia Public Prosecutor’s Office has announced the closure of the investigation into Andrea Sempio in connection with the death of Chiara Poggi. Sempio may face trial.

by Patrizia Maciocchi

28 September 2026

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Alberto Stasi all'uscita dal palazzo della Cassazione, 5 aprile 2013 a Roma. ANSA/MASSIMO PERCOSSI ANSA

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Versione italiana

Key points

The Poggi family’s lawyers
Assessments of Sempio’s capacity
A lack of in-depth analysis of DNA in the past
Sempio’s lawyers

5' min read

Translated by AI

Versione italiana

‘It should be noted that no application has been made with a view to drawing up a proposal to review the conviction against Alberto Stasi has ever been made to the Attorney General, who has been and will be kept informed regarding any matter deemed to be of interest’. However, ‘once the statutory time limits have expired, decisions will be taken regarding the criminal proceedings’.

This clarification is contained in the statement in which the Pavia Public Prosecutor’s Office announces the closure of the investigation into Andrea Sempio, as part of the investigation into the death of Chiara Poggi. Today, Sempio was served with the notice of the conclusion of the preliminary investigations. And, as provided for in Article 415 bis of the Code of Criminal Procedure, all the documents, including the supplementary investigations, have been filed. The charge against the man under investigation remains unchanged.

In the press release, the Public Prosecutor’s Office outlined the findings of the technical analyses ordered during the investigation, relating to the circumstances of the attack, the bloodstains, footprint 33 and the shoe print found in the villa in Garlasco. As regards the latter, the Public Prosecutor’s experts report that the findings do not support a physical incompatibility between Sempio’s foot and the footprint. A subsequent assessment also revealed that the measurements of his foot were compatible with those of a size 42 Frau shoe.

From a forensic perspective, the new analyses ordered by the Public Prosecutor’s Office, carried out by Professor Cristina Cattaneo and Professor Biagio Fugenio Leone, indicate that the injuries sustained by Chiara Poggi were caused by before her death, with a minimum interval estimated to be between 15 and 30 minutes and a possible survival time of up to 60 minutes. The cause of death is confirmed as the injury to the occiput. According to the experts, the overall picture is consistent with a struggle and with defensive injuries. The Public Prosecutor’s Office also clarifies that two electrophoretic analyses dated 20 September 2007 were identified on the DNA sample taken from the pedals of the ‘Umberto Dei’ bicycle, attributed at the time to Chiara Poggi, both of which were negative. These results, which were not included in the case files of the trial against Alberto Stasi, have been confirmed by the Public Prosecutor’s Office’s experts, who deemed it necessary to carry out a more detailed investigation at the time, which was not undertaken. As for the psychiatric assessment of Sempio, Professor Roberto Catanesi stated that he was unable to answer the questions without a direct clinical examination, which the suspect refused to undergo. The investigations into Sempio’s mental capacity have therefore been suspended.

The Poggi family’s lawyers

According to the Poggi family’s lawyers, Gian Luigi Tizzoni and Francesco Compagna, the ‘information’ contained in the press release in which the Pavia Public Prosecutor’s Office announced that it had served a new notice of the closure of investigations against Andrea Sempio “merely reiterate lines of evidence that are already known and have been thoroughly examined in the ‘trial’ of Alberto Stasi, as can be seen at from a genetic perspective as well as from a forensic medical perspective’.

“At this stage, we hope that the case can be referred to the competent Court of Appeal as soon as possible” (the Court of Appeal in Brescia, which has jurisdiction over the review, ed.), stated the lawyers representing the parents and brother of the 26-year-old woman murdered in Garlasco on 13 August 2007, “which will be able to note the absence of any new evidence , hopefully putting an end to the misguided search for an alternative culprit”.

Tizzoni and Compagna emphasised that the ‘evidence’ against Stasi ‘was obtained during cross-examination’. The Poggi family’s lawyers added that the only new element in the Pavia public prosecutors’ case file – and one that had been ‘carried out in recent months’ from May to the present – was ‘a further technical analysis commissioned by one party, aimed at supporting the abstract possibility that Andrea Sempio had worn those Frau size 42 shoes that day, contrary to common sense’.

Investigation into Sempio’s capacity suspended

The investigations “into the capacity” of Andrea Sempio by the Pavia Public Prosecutor’s Office have, as things stand, been suspended”. This has once again been clarified by the Pavia Public Prosecutor’s Office, headed by Fabio Napoleone. The consultant Roberto Catanesi, tasked with carrying out the psychiatric assessment of the 38-year-old, stated that he had ‘analytically examined all the evidence made available by the investigators and arising from the various investigations carried out’.

‘Data of undoubted interest have emerged,’ writes Catanesi in his expert report, ‘which, however – as has already been clarified verbally – necessarily require – in order to provide an answer to the questions that can be said to be methodologically appropriate to the context of the investigation - comparison and verification with data derived from a direct clinical examination of the suspect.”

However, as the Public Prosecutor’s Office points out, Sempio ‘refused to undergo a medical examination’, and the consultant stated that he ‘did not have sufficient evidence to provide answers to the questions that could be considered adequately substantiated and methodologically sound’.

A lack of in-depth analysis of DNA in the past

The Pavia Public Prosecutor’s Office has requested clarification from members of the RIS in Parma at the time regarding the results of the DNA re-tests carried out on the pedal of Alberto Stasi’s bicycle and attributed to Chiara Poggi, despite the fact that the results of those tests were ‘negative’. The Public Prosecutor’s Office’s new consultants have ‘confirmed the existence’ of the negative results and, in light of this ‘discrepancy’, have concluded that there would have been ‘an opportunity for a more in-depth investigation which, however, according to recent investigations carried out by the Pavia Public Prosecutor’s Office, does not appear to have been carried out’.

Sempio’s lawyers

“The tampering with evidence against Alberto Stasi has nothing to do with the charge brought today against Andrea Sempio”: the lawyer Liborio Cataliotti, who, together with Angela Taccia, is representing Sempio, commented as follows on the new developments emerging from the conclusion of the investigation – the second into the Garlasco case.

“The only thing different about the 18-page notice is the date,” claims the lawyer, who is ready to fight it out even over the footprints. ‘His foot could not have been in the shoe that left the murderer’s footprint. We’re told there was an increase in the weight of the foot; we take note of that, but we have, on the other hand, heard from two witnesses who state – providing corroborating evidence – that at the time Sempio was already wearing a size 44, not a size 42.”

The first step now for the suspect’s lawyers is to ‘request a copy of the documents arising after 6 May’ – the date on which the initial phase of the investigation concluded – and then to submit further defence submissions, despite the fact that the expert reports commissioned by the Pavia Public Prosecutor’s Office are ‘always drawn up by the same consultants’. As for the accusation that the defence’s expert reports lack scientific rigour, Cataliotti describes this as ‘speculation’, given that ‘our expert report retraces, follows and adopts the findings of the investigations carried out by Colonel Mattei, who was in charge of the RIS unit that conducted the analysis of the footprints on the ground’.