Ranucci may be questioned by prosecutors following an analysis of Lavitola’s mobile phone
Once the analysis of Valter Lavitola’s mobile phone and computer has been completed, investigators from the Rome Public Prosecutor’s Office may summon Sigfrido Ranucci to interview him as a person with knowledge of the facts.
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Once the analysis of Valter Lavitola’s mobile phone and computer has been completed, investigators from the Rome Public Prosecutor’s Office may summon Sigfrido Ranucci to interview him as a person with knowledge of the facts.
According to reports, the technical work on the devices is expected to take a few weeks; consequently, any hearing involving the presenter of *Report* is unlikely to be scheduled before September.
Lavitola: ‘I ordered shots to be fired at Ranucci’s villa’
Valter Lavitola has confessed to being the instigator of the attack on the journalist Sigfrido Ranucci. This was revealed by lawyer Sergio Cola at the end of the preliminary hearing on Wednesday 12 August. “Lavitola confirmed the prosecution’s case by admitting that he was the instigator of the attack and claims to have done so to protect Sigfrido Ranucci, who had been the target of several dangerous attempts to assault him and to have his security level raised.” The defence lawyer has applied for house arrest, a request which the Public Prosecutor’s Office has rejected.
‘I ordered the shooting at Ranucci’s villa’
Lavitola had instructed the perpetrators to carry out an attack on his friend Ranucci using “various methods”. Not an explosive device, therefore, but “four or five gunshots fired at the wall” of the *Report* presenter’s villa in Pomezia, a town near Rome. Following the bomb attack last October – according to what has emerged from the hearing before the investigating magistrate – the suspect reportedly had no objections, considering the explosion of a rudimentary device to be of “demonstrative value” in any case.
‘An attack carried out for his own good’
Lavitola “also explained the reasons why he was driven to commit this undoubtedly criminal act. He did so for Ranucci’s own good, because Ranucci was the target of attacks,” added the lawyer. Lavitola – again according to his lawyer – is said to have acted “to protect Ranucci’s safety, as he was the target of several dangerous attempts on his life. This was also because Ranucci, at the time, had no security detail, but only two bodyguards. Since the attackers, in Lavitola’s view, were extremely dangerous, he did it because, in fact, after the attack, the security detail was more than doubled – increasing from two to eight officers, who provided protection in a horseshoe formation.”
