Italian court deliberates appeal of 2 US men in cop killing
Italy’s highest court has started deliberations in what should be the final appeal of two U.S. citizens convicted in the stabbing death of a police officer during a plainclothes operation in Rome
ROME (AP) — Italy’s highest court started deliberations Wednesday in what should be the final appeal of two U.S. citizens convicted in the stabbing death of a police officer during a plainclothes operation in Rome in the summer of 2019.
Finnegan Lee Elder, now 23, and Gabriel Natale-Hjorth, now 22, were convicted in May 2021 of slaying the 35-year-old officer, as well as of attempted extortion, resisting a public official and carrying an attack-style knife without just cause.
The two men, who were friends in northern California before they traveled to Italy together, initially received life sentences, Italy’s most severe penalty. An appeals court last year upheld their convictions, but reduced the sentences to 24 years for Elder and 22 years for Natale-Hjorth.
The Italian legal system allows defendants another appeal to Italy's Supreme Court of Cassation, which heard some seven hours of arguments before going into deliberations Wednesday evening. The court can either uphold the convictions or send the case back for a retrial if it finds errors in the rules of law.
