On Tuesday, June 10, 1924, shortly before 4:30 p.m., the Honorable Giacomo Matteotti left his home on Via Pisanelli and took the Tiber embankment (photos 8.1.1), heading for Parliament; he has under his arm the envelope from the Chamber (8.1.2), which he usually carried, with a few papers and his passport. He is attacked around the corner, on the Lungotevere Arnaldo da Brescia (8.1.3), while walking to Montecitorio. He has recently turned 39 and is the secretary of the United Socialist Party. He is shot by a group of fascists, all members of the so-called “Fascist Cheka”, the secret police formed by Cesare – for all Cesarino – Rossi (8.1.4) on Mussolini’s orders. They are led by Amerigo Dumini, and with him are – in addition to other accomplices, such as Filippo Panzeri and Aldo Putato, who control the scene, and the basista Otto Thierschädl – Albino Volpi, Giuseppe Viola, Augusto Malacria and Amleto Poveromo (8.1.5). The deputy is forcibly loaded into a car, a black Lancia, which drives away at high speed (8.1.6). He desperately defends himself, throwing his MP card out the window. Unable to hold him down, Viola grabs a dagger and hits Matteotti between the armpit and chest, killing him. The car with the corpse drives around the Roman countryside for a long time, until the body is dumped and buried somehow near Riano, in the woods (the Macchia) of the Quartarella (8.1.7). This is the essential dynamic of the facts, which will gradually emerge, in more detailed form, in the reconstruction of the investigators and from the testimonies collected.

Witnessing the scene that afternoon, and testifying, were the two children Amilcare Mascagna and Renato Barzotti, garbage man Giovanni Pucci (8.1.8) and clerk Giovanni Tavanna. Another witness, concierge Ester D’Erasmi, had jotted down the license plate number of the suspicious car driving around the neighborhood the night before: 55-12169. This is the key to the investigation. The car had been rented by Filippo Filippelli (8.1.9), editor of the “Corriere Italiano” (8.1.10), a newspaper flanking Fascism, and delivered by him to Dumini – a past as a daredevil and a squadrist, with a stormy criminal record, who boasts of being an assassin – who formally turns out to be employed by the newspaper.

That evening, alone at home with the children, Velia spends hours of anguished waiting; she telephones her sisters, in Milan, and decides that the next day she will go to ask for news in Parliament, to Giacomo’s colleagues. On Wednesday 11, Matteotti’s absence, registered to speak in the House, is noticed. Concern begins to spread among the Socialist deputies, put on notice by Velia; in the afternoon Menè Modigliani (8.1.11) goes to her and then to the Questura to report the disappearance.

Dumini is arrested on the evening of June 12, 1924, at Termini Station in Rome, as he is about to leave for the North. In his suitcase he has Matteotti’s bloody pants (8.1.12).

On Friday, June 13, the news of Matteotti’s kidnapping is on the front page of “La Giustizia” (8.1.13); the next day, the disappearance of the PSU secretary opens the front pages of all newspapers, starting with “Corriere della Sera” (8.1.14). Nothing is known about the disappeared, but people think the worst. “La Stampa” headlines “The Hon. Matteotti has not yet been found, but no doubt now about the execrable crime”. The hope of finding Giacomo Matteotti alive has vanished.

On Saturday the 14th the Prime Minister, Benito Mussolini, receives Velia stating that he is doing everything to find him. He tells her that he hopes to return her husband to her soon. In his desk drawer he has Matteotti’s bloody passport. The head of the government, urged on by the oppositions, then reports to the House, “Only an enemy who for long nights had been thinking of something diabolical, could carry out the crime that today strikes us with horror and wrenches from us cries of indignation”.

Police and investigating magistrates are immediately at work: the first interviews of witnesses take place, inspections are carried out (8.1.5, 8.1.16). The magistrate in charge of the investigations is Mauro Del Giudice, an uncompromising jurist and defender of the independence of the judiciary; he is joined by Umberto Guglielmo Tancredi, deputy prosecutor, who seems more agreeable to the government, but will prove to be a rigorous investigator (8.1.17). The police are also mobilized. Scientific police investigations, coordinated by Ugo Sorrentino, who would write the successful treatise Science Against Crime (8.1.18), which conducts careful surveys of the car used in the hijacking, meanwhile found with its interior torn and smeared with blood (8.1.19, 8.1.20, 8.1.21, 8.1.22, 8.1.23).

Within a short time all those responsible for the crime and some of the flankers are arrested. But the complicity of the regime and the responsibilities of Mussolini’s collaborators, starting with press bureau chief Cesarino Rossi, and of such an important figure as the head of the Police and Militia, Senator Emilio De Bono, are now evident.

The bewilderment and horror are enormous, in Italy and abroad. Everywhere there are spontaneous demonstrations of dissent and distancing from the government, believed to be involved in the affair. Socialists are mobilized. Many fascists return their membership cards.

Realizing the need to meet the growing public demand for justice, on June 17 Mussolini forced the resignation of Cesare Rossi and Aldo Finzi (8.1.24), undersecretary of the Interior, indicated by public opinion and by Del Giudice’s investigations as those most involved because of known associations with Dumini’s men. Police chief De Bono is also resigned, and the following day Mussolini himself gives up the interim of the Interior Ministry, which he entrusts to Luigi Federzoni (8.1.25).

The PSU, led by Turati, issues a press release accusing the government, “The political authority assures diligent investigations to bring the culprits to justice, but its action appears totally invested with the suspicion that it neither wanted, nor could strike at the deep roots of the crime, nor unveil the environment from which the thugs emerged”.

On June 18, in Rome’s Regina Coeli prison, Del Giudice interrogated Filippo Filippelli, who stated that Dumini, on the evening of June 10, had revealed to him the existence of the Ceka: “a special operation on behalf of an organism that arose within the party’s quadrumvirate, and was directed by Cesare Rossi and the administrative secretary of the National Fascist Party, Giovanni Marinelli”.

June 18, Marinelli (8.1.26), is arrested. In Milan, the Arditi Fascisti organization is dissolved by the prefect. On June 22 former PNF political deputy secretary Cesare Rossi, at that time head of the press office of the Prime Minister’s Office, voluntarily turns himself in.

The front of omertà covering Mussolini is beginning to crumble. A signal is needed from the institutions in support of the government and the regime. The king is silent. Days earlier he had received Mussolini flaunting cordiality. However, the head of the government needs a vote of confidence, without exposing himself in the insecure camp of the House. On June 26, 1924, the Senate is convened and, by a large majority, reaffirms confidence in Mussolini with 225 votes in favor (including that of Benedetto Croce) out of 252. The only three senators to denounce Mussolini’s responsibilities, despite the threats he received, are Carlo Sforza (8.1.27), Mario Abbiate and Luigi Albertini (8.1.28).

On June 27, 1924, the deputies of the oppositions-who would form a committee-at the proposal of Giovanni Amendola (8.1.29) met in the Sala della Lupa in Montecitorio, later known as the “Sala dell’Aventino”, deciding to abandon parliamentary work until the government clarified its position regarding the Matteotti murder. The goal is to obtain the fall of the government, thanks in part to a hoped-for crown intervention, which will not occur, in order to go to new elections (8.1.30).

On that occasion Filippo Turati commemorated, in particularly emotional accents, Giacomo Matteotti (8.1.31) and entrusts to the collective memory his image as a Martyr for freedom: Giacomo is, in Turati’s oratory, the death volunteer, the one who affirms, “Kill me, but the idea in me you will never kill … my idea does not die … my children will glory in their father … the workers will bless my corpse”.

The next day some parliamentarians made a pilgrimage to the place where Matteotti had been abducted and laid a laurel wreath (8.1.32, 8.1.33). On the Tiber embankment a pitiful hand painted a cross where flowers have been laid by citizens for days (8.1.34). Many stop in prayer (8.1.35).

Beyond the epaulette is planted a cross with a rosette, which will soon be made to disappear (8.1.36).

On July 8, the government enacts the decree-law, passed the previous year but never published, which severely restricts freedom of the press and subjects newspapers to prefect control. The Chamber of Deputies is closed by Mussolini for a long, long summer recess of its work.

Meanwhile, the search for Matteotti’s body continues, as feverish as it is useless. Rumors spread that it was thrown into Lake Vico, and searches and inspections by magistrates immediately began (photos 8.2.1), the police of many socialist exponents (8.2.2, 8.2.3) and willing ones. The news turns out to be groundless, probably a red herring, like many others being fed in the summer of 1924.

On August 14, a cantoner patrolling a road between Sacrofano and Riano found, in the ditch used for water drainage, a jacket stained with blood and missing its left sleeve (8.2.4, 8.2.5, 8.2.6). This is learned by Carabinieri Captain Pallavicini, who is searching for Matteotti’s body in that area. He interrogates the cantoniere and gets everything handed over. His men find nearby the missing sleeve, stained with blood. They show everything to Velia Matteotti, who confirms: it is her husband’s jacket.

The corpse is found on the morning of August 16 in Riano, in the Quartarella scrubland, inside Prince Boncompagni’s estate; it is found by Ovidio Caratelli (8.2.7), a Carabinieri brigadier on leave and the son of a guardian of the estate. Caratelli will claim that he was guided by the sniffer dog Trapani, but many circumstances authorize the suggestion that the find was artfully planned. Investigators (8.2.8) and fellow party members, led by Turati (8.2.9), rushed to the scene.

Forensic police promptly go to work and find everything (8.2.10, 8.2.11, 8.2.12).

The body is temporarily transferred to Riano (8.2.13, 8.2.14, 8.2.15), where on the 18th identification is made by his brothers-in-law and some deputies. The corpse is now in an advanced state of decomposition, and the dentist who had been treating Matteotti is then summoned to identify the operations on his teeth.

On the morning of August 17, the news of the body’s discovery is taken up with the greatest prominence in the national press. For Mussolini’s newspaper, Il Popolo d’Italia, this puts an end to any “speculation” (8.2.16, 8.2.17).

After all medico-legal tests and procedures are completed, the coffin is transferred to Monterotondo station (8.2.18), where a large crowd gathered (8.2.19, 8.2.20). On the evening of August 19, the train on which the coffin with Matteotti’s body is loaded leaves Monterotondo Scalo (8.2.21, 8.2.22) bound for Fratta Polesine, where it arrives at 6 a.m. the next morning. The overnight transport is imposed by the government, against Velia’s wishes, to prevent public demonstrations of condolences as the train passes.

In making arrangements with Interior Minister Federzoni for the transport of the body, the widow demanded that no PNF or Militia members be present during the transport and during the funeral.

“I request that no representation of the Fascist Militia be an escort to the train: no Fascist militiaman of any rank or office appear, not even in the form of a service officer. I ask that no black shirts appear before the coffin and my eyes during the entire journey, nor in Fratta Polesine, until the body is buried. I want to travel as a simple citizen, doing her duty in order to be able to demand her rights; hence, no car-salon, no reserved compartment, no facilities or privileges; but no arrangements to change the train’s route as it appears in the public domain timetable. If reasons of public order impose a service of order, let it be entrusted only to soldiers of Italy”.

On the morning of August 20, upon arrival in Fratta Polesine, the body was laid to rest in the entrance hall of Casa Matteotti (8.2.23), a few hundred meters from the railroad. A poster of Polesine socialists gives news of the funeral the next day (8.2.24).

On August 21, 1924, Matteotti’s funeral in Fratta Polesine was attended by about ten thousand people, three times the number of the town’s inhabitants. Among them were also many fascists, but not in black shirts, as requested by the widow. (8.2.25, 8.2.26, 8.2.27, 8.2.28).

The procession is made up with the crown of the United Socialist Party (8.2.29), then the flowers and insignia of the Chamber of Deputies, the Municipality of Fratta, and then all the others. This is followed by the soldiers of the III Engineer Battalion, then the coffin, then the widow. The coffin is carried on the shoulders of Velia’s family members: Titta Ruffo, Emerico Steiner, Titta Ruffo Jr. and Mino Steiner (8.2.30, 8.2.31, 8.2.32). At the cemetery (8.3.33) peasants climb over the walls past the Carabinieri blockade: they shout invectives against the government but the widow urges them to calm down. Shouts are raised among the socialists present: “Revenge!… Long live Matteotti! Long live the martyr! Long live freedom!….” Velia tells them and the women bearing flowers, “Go home. Be good, and love each other as Jesus Christ taught” (8.2.34). There are no pictures of her. Little Bughi, Waffle and Chicco wear mourning (8.2.35).

After the funeral, the first “holy cards” remembering Giacomo Matteotti began to spread (photos 8.3.1). Meanwhile, further investigations in August, investigators acquired forensic police records and determined that the congressman died from a stab wound inflicted on the left side of the chest while he was still in the car.

On September 18, 1924, the so-called “batch” of 43 new senators is formalized. In view of the possible constitution of the Senate into a High Court of Justice, Mussolini, in full agreement with the king to whom the appointment falls, consolidates the seats in Palazzo Madama (8.3.2) with men of proven Fascist faith.

From October 9 “Il Popolo” is the official organ of the People’s Party. On October 25, Don Luigi Sturzo is forced to leave Italy (8.3.3). While memos – of self-defense or with a threatening purpose – of the various actors in the affair, from Cesare Rossi to Filippo Filippelli, a novelty comes resoundingly to take the investigation away from the ordinary judiciary. On December 6, 1924, Giuseppe Donati (8.3.4), editor of “Il Popolo” and a respected investigative journalist, filed a complaint against Emilio De Bono (8.3.5) accused, among other charges, of deception in the investigation into the murder of Giacomo Matteotti. Since De Bono was a senator of the Kingdom, the trial was transferred to the Senate, constituted into the High Court of Justice as provided for in Article 4 of the Judicial Regulations in the Upper Chamber.

Mauro Del Giudice, in his memoirs, will write that Donati’s complaint is the “main and original cause of the failure of the long investigation that has reached its climax”.

Subtracted from the ordinary justice system, the acts passed to the Standing Committee on Instruction of the High Court of Justice in the Senate chaired by General Vittorio Zuppelli (8.3.6). Among the charges brought against De Bono is the accusation that he was part of a criminal association, known by the name “Cheka,” and that he “cooperated in the carrying out of the crime and favored its material executors”.

At the end of the month, events precipitate. While Giovanni Amendola’s “Il Mondo” publishes Cesare Rossi’s memoir (8.3.7), in which the Duce’s former right-hand man explicitly accuses the party leadership of being responsible for the murder of Giacomo Matteotti, the majority experiences moments of great tension. On December 29, 1924, Mussolini summoned the editors of the Party newspapers to declare that “the attempt to separate the Leader from the wingmen is a vain and insane effort”, and reassured his people that “the orderly legislative developments of our Revolution, which will have to adapt men and institutions to the ever-increasing needs of the Fatherland”, would be adopted shortly.

This is the context, this is the premise of the speech that Benito Mussolini delivered, on the afternoon of January 3, 1925, in the Chamber of Deputies (8.3.8). It is, for Italy, the point of no return:

“It is I, O gentlemen, who raise in this House the accusation against myself. It was said that I would establish a Cheka. Where, when? In what way? No one could say…

But then, O gentlemen, what butterflies are we going to look for under the arch of Titus?

Well, I declare here, in the presence of this assembly, and in the presence of all the Italian people, that I assume (I alone!) responsibility (political! moral! historical!) for all that has taken place. If more or less crippled phrases are enough to hang a man, out with the pole and out with the rope! If Fascism was nothing but castor oil and truncheon and not instead a superb passion of the best Italian youth, blame me! If Fascism has been a crime syndicate, to me the responsibility for that, because this historical, political and moral climate I created it” (8.3.9).

On the night of January 3, Luigi Federzoni, minister of the Interior, sent confidential telegrams to prefects that translated Mussolini’s authoritarian intentions into practice. The so-called “fascistissime laws” would then complete the work, stifling any remaining freedom.

IN THE SENATE

Chaired by General Vittorio Zuppelli, the Senate High Court of Justice works quickly. The proceedings against Emilio De Bono ended with a ruling on June 12, 1925, declaring that there was “no need to proceed” against De Bono “for non-existence of the fact” with regard to the main charge and for not having contributed to the realization of the fact with regard to the other charges. Cleared of the charges, De Bono will later be appointed the governor of Libya (photos 8.4.1).

After five months, the proceedings were returned by the Senate to the Prosecution Section of the Court of Appeals in Rome, which could resume the investigation. But on Sept. 4, 1925, the president of the Prosecution Section, Mauro Del Giudice, is promoted to prosecutor general of the Catania Court of Appeals and replaced by Antonio Albertini. Guglielmo Tancredi was also promoted to deputy prosecutor general at the Court of Cassation and replaced in the post by Nicodemo Del Vasto (8.4.2), brother-in-law of Roberto Farinacci, a well-known member of the National Fascist Party and future defender of Dumini in the Chieti trial.

The investigation by the new Roman magistrates concluded with the December 1, 1925, ruling: the Prosecution Section accepted the prosecutor general’s requests and remanded for trial the five material executors of the murder – Dumini, Volpi, Viola, Poveromo and Malacria – excluding, however, premeditation as an aggravating circumstance. There is, on the other hand, no place to proceed against Putato and Panzeri, for insufficient evidence; for the other defendants – Marinelli, Filippelli, Rossi and Naldi – for not having committed the deed, nor having participated in it. It is well understood that the regime trial invoked by many, and to which Pietro Nenni had dedicated a book that was immediately seized (8.4.3), will not take place.

IN CHIETI

Invoking “grave reasons of public safety”, the Court of Cassation on Dec. 21, 1925 granted the petition of the attorney general at the Court of Appeal in Rome and transferred Matteotti’s trial to Chieti, to the Court of Assizes. Christened the “chamomile city” by the press, Chieti is a quiet, easily controlled town, far from metropolitan clamor (8.4.4).

Mussolini wants the trial to take place without clamor (8.4.5) and forbids all street demonstrations, even on the fascist side. Roberto Farinacci is of a different opinion (8.4.6) who, being a lawyer, wears the defense attorney’s robe and intends to turn the trial into a political forum. The context is, moreover, favorable to him: the ladies of the best Teatine society personally sew the toga of the ras of Cremona. Thanks to an iron control of the prefectural authority and the police, the trial is held quietly, according to the Duce’s directives.

It lasts for only 8 hearings, which are held beginning March 16, 1926 (8.4.7). It is clear from the outset that this will be a political trial, which will not do justice (8.4.8). In a painful choice, Velia Matteotti renounces her right to enter a civil suit and writes this to the president of the Tribunal. The act will be accompanied by a note from the plaintiff’s lawyer, Menè Modigliani, which sounds like a harsh indictment. Representing the family will remain in the courtroom another friend and companion of Giacomo Matteotti, lawyer Pasquale Galliano Magno (8.4.9). Closed the trial, the regime will make life very difficult for both lawyers.

The trial is presided over by Francesco Danza, the prosecution is supported by Attorney General Alberto Salucci, and the defense of the defendants, as foretold, is entrusted to the fluent and patriotic oratory of Roberto Farinacci. The jurors, responding to the 35 questions put to them, find only Dumini, Volpi and Poveromo guilty of “corresponding complicity in manslaughter” (8.4.10, 8.4.11). Therefore, premeditation is ruled out while general extenuating circumstances are granted: the three are sentenced to 5 years, 11 months and 20 days’ imprisonment as well as perpetual disqualification from public office (8.4.12). Taking into account the imprisonment already served and the amnesties granted by the regime, they will be freed shortly thereafter (8.4.13). Instead, the defendants Viola and Malacria are acquitted of the proceedings, for not having committed the act. Thus ends what will go down in history as the “farce trial” of Chieti (8.4.14).

IN ROME, in 1947

With the fall of the Fascist regime on Sept. 8, 1943, while there was still fighting in central and northern Italy, the government of General Pietro Badoglio issued the July 27, 1944, Luogotenenziale Decree No. 159, which stipulated that sentences handed down for Fascist crimes could be declared “legally nonexistent” when the state of moral coercion brought about by Fascism influenced the decision. The Chieti trial is, therefore, null and void.

The Supreme Court (8.4.15) thus declares the previous rulings nonexistent and once again transmits the acts to the Court of Appeals, which in turn entrusts the investigation to the competent section in Rome, headed by Gennaro Giuffrè, which also acquires Mauro del Giudice’s memorial (8.4.16). The file is initially opened against Benito Mussolini and others, but the death of the Duce and other potential co-defendants means that in the trial that follows – in the spring of 1947, with the prosecution supported by prosecutor Giovanni Spagnuolo – only Domini, Viola and Poveromo are convicted. In a ruling on April 4, 1947, the Rome Court of Assise (8.4.17) sentences them to life imprisonment, later commuted to 30 years imprisonment. The Court sends Filippelli free because the crimes he committed (complicity and aiding and abetting) were extinguished by the amnesty; again because of the extinction of the crimes as a result of the amnesty, the Court declares that there is no need to proceed against the other defendants: Rossi, Giunta, and Panzeri. Viola, a longtime fugitive, is convicted in absentia. Amleto Poveromo (8.4.18) dies in prison in Parma, Italy, in 1953, at age 59. Cheka leader Amerigo Dumini is released from prison after six years, in 1953, and is then pardoned permanently in 1956; he recounts his fictional life in his autobiography titled 17 Shots. He died at Christmas 1967, aged 73, from a domestic accident (8.4.19).