ROME (AP) — One of the two Americans convicted in the 2019 stabbing death of an Italian plainclothes police officer has been granted house arrest after a the Court of Appeal has been significantly reduced his original life sentence.
Gabriel Natale-Hjorth can serve his 11-year and four-month sentence at a grandparent’s home in the coastal town of Fregene, west of Rome, state news agencies RAI and LaPresse reported, citing the court decision.
Natale-Hjorth and Finnegan Lee Elder, both from California, had been convicted in July 2019, the killing of Carabinieri Deputy Brigadier Mario Cerciello Rega in a botched sting operation after a drug deal in Rome went bad. After the first trial, both were sentenced to life in prison, Italy’s harshest punishment.
Italy’s Supreme Court of Cassation last year ordered a new one the trial, which ruled that it had not been proven beyond a reasonable doubt that the Americans, with limited Italian language skills, had understood that they were dealing with Italian police officers when they went to meet the alleged drug dealer.
An appeal court earlier this month, the original penalties were significantly reduced. Finnegan, who carried the knife, is serving a prison term of 15 years and two months.
Teenagers at the time of the murder, the former schoolmates from the San Francisco Bay Area had met in Rome to spend a few days on vacation. The fateful confrontation took place after they had met with a minor drug dealer, who turned out to be a police informant, to recover money lost in a bad drug deal. Instead, they were confronted by two police officers.
Cerciello Riga was stabbed 11 times with a knife from the hotel room.