Death of Igor Squeo, 33: six police officers and one doctor entered in investigation register
The Milan General Prosecutor's Office has taken over the investigation into the death of Igor Squeo, 33, who died following a police intervention in 2022. Seven suspects including officers and one doctor.
Squeo case: General Prosecutor's Office investigates six police officers and one doctor over death of 33-year-old
Six police officers and a doctor have been entered in the investigation register for the death of Igor Squeo, the 33-year-old from Milan who died in the night between 11 and 12 June 2022, four hours after a police intervention at his flat. The news was reported by the television programme Chi l'ha visto?, as covered by Il Fatto Quotidiano - Cronaca.
According to the reconstruction of the case file, that night a police patrol intervened to break up a fight between Squeo and an Ivorian youth. The young man, agitated and under the influence of drugs, was handcuffed on hands and feet and pinned to the ground. The police officers called a doctor, who administered a drug to sedate him. Squeo died in hospital approximately four hours later.
The charge: positional asphyxia and drug administered without monitoring
The General Prosecutor's Office of the Court of Appeal of Milan, headed by prosecutor Francesca Nanni, has taken over the investigation after prosecutors had submitted two requests for case dismissal, hypothesising death from "acute cocaine intoxication". Nanni, together with deputy prosecutor Massimo Gaballo, has accepted the request of the family's lawyers.
According to the General Prosecutor's Office, the previous investigations had "completely disregarded the investigative hypothesis proposed by the civil parties": that Squeo died from positional asphyxia caused by "improper physical restraint" during the officers' intervention, a circumstance "reported by emergency medical personnel". In essence, the 33-year-old would not have been able to breathe because of the weight of the police officers immobilising him on the ground, potentially aggravated by the drug used to sedate him.
Positions of the investigated parties
Four officers are investigated for manslaughter, with the charge of subjecting Squeo to "improper restraint". Two other police officers are charged with forgery for having altered the service report.
The doctor is investigated for culpable homicide and forgery: according to the case file, she would have administered an anaesthetic drug to the young man "without monitoring, despite oxygen saturation at 82%", and then modified the rescue report falsely indicating "oxygen saturation of 96%".
Forensic examination and possible exhumation
In recent days the General Prosecutor's Office has asked Judge Maria Idria Gurgo di Castelmenardo to order a forensic examination in probative proceedings to "establish the causes of death". The examination, the Pg emphasises, could also necessitate exhumation of the body, in order to "verify the presence of additional bone fractures, apart from those found during the autopsy".
The case has also been followed in recent years by Verdi-Sinistra parliamentary representative Ilaria Cucchi.
Source: Il Fatto Quotidiano - Cronaca