ITALY: Death of a Fascist

A closed grey van drove into the courtyard of Rome’s Fort Bravetta. It stopped by a hillock of brown grass, browner dirt. In front of the hillock stood a nakedly bare pine chair.*

The van’s rear door opened. A file of carabinieri in grey-green uniforms stepped out. One of them carried a pair of crutches. A black-robed priest came next Then, leaning on the shoulders of two carabinieri, Pietro Caruso appeared.

First Italian Fascist condemned by a court of Italy’s national government, Caruso had been the most hated man in Rome since Mussolini sent him down from the north to be chief of the capital’s police and quell the rising opposition to war and Fascism. He had been a practising sadist. He had kept a private apartment where he personally tortured prize victims. He had been lame since the day a gnat flew into his eye as he raced northward in an open car to escape the Allies. The car had swerved into a ditch. Caruso broke his hip.

Now his left foot barely touched the ground as he leaned on the carabinieri. He had stood so when he cried to the court that all he had done was at the orders of higher Fascists and Germans. He had stood so when he was condemned. Now he stood at the place of his death. He wore a bright blue suit, well cut. A white handkerchief flowered from his jacket pocket. He had not shaved well.

“Aim Well.” A carabiniere brought his crutches. Caruso carefully hunched his body on them, swung himself over to the chair. He had trouble straddling it, his face to the hillock. Quickly Caruso’s pudgy body was bound to the chair’s back. Then he was left with the priest. They talked. Caruso prayed and kissed a tiny crucifix attached to a specially blessed rosary that Pope Pius XII had sent him. The priest stepped away.

Caruso turned his head a little. Those nearest heard him say, in a voice that was neither a cry nor a shout, but a husky statement, startingly clear: “Viva l’Italia! Aim well.”

Eight standing, eight kneeling, 16 policemen aimed well, fired. A straight row of white cut stitched across Caruso’s back. The back of his head dissolved. For a still moment the courtyard belonged to death. Then there was a brief babel as photographers rushed in for closeups.

*Execution by shooting a seated man in the back is an old Fascist custom.