Rome, Jan 2 (EFE) – Italy has started 2024 with a political storm triggered after an attendee at a New Year’s Eve party with members of the ruling far-right party Brothers of Italy (HdI) was wounded by a gun legally owned by a lawmaker.
At a party in the small village of Rosazza, in the northern Piedmont region, a gun owned by lawmaker Emanuele Pozzolo went off injuring the son-in-law of a bodyguard for Andrea Delmastro, the undersecretary of justice and the brother of Francesca Delmastro, the mayor of Rosazza, who was also at the event.
Pozzeto issued a statement Monday night saying: “I confirm that the shot was fired accidentally from a gun I legally own, but I was not the shooter.”
According to an initial reconstruction of the facts: Pozzolo, 38, arrived sometime after 1 a.m. after spending New Year’s Eve with his family, and at some point appears to have shown guests his North American Arms LR22, one of the smallest commercially available. The gun was passed from guest to guest before it went off, striking one of them in the leg.
The wounded 31-year-old was taken by ambulance to the nearest hospital and discharged after treatment, but will be on medical leave for a week, according to local media reports.
The center-left opposition leader has called on Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni to take action against the members of her party involved.
“These incompetents are a danger to the safety of those around them, not to mention national security. Let Meloni clarify what measures she intends to take against Deputy Pozzolo, who goes to parties with a loaded gun in his pocket and ends up injuring a person,” said Elly Schlein of the Democratic Party.
The Public Prosecutor’s Office of the city of Biella, to which Rosazza belongs, has opened an investigation to determine responsibility, although the incident is not being investigated as intentional.
Deputy Pozzolo, who as the legal proprietor of the gun had the responsibility over it, has refused to submit himself to a gunpowder test on the grounds of his parliamentary immunity.
Delmastro, one of the most controversial members of Meloni’s cabinet, who is being prosecuted in a case of alleged leaking of secrets, told Italian media that he had stepped out to his car when the gun went off.
“Those who were there told me that he had pulled out the weapon, a gun the size of a cigarette lighter, to show it. Then the shot went off accidentally,” Delmastro said.
Meloni has not yet commented on these facts, and a public appearance is not scheduled until the year-end press conference, which she is expected to offer this Thursday after twice postponing it due to health problems.
Meloni’s party has downplayed the incident and considers “absurd” the “attempt to turn what happened into a political case to attack” the prime minister.
“It is an event on which the competent authorities will carry out the appropriate verifications to determine responsibilities. If irregular or inappropriate behavior on the part of Pozzolo emerges, appropriate measures will be taken by the party,” the HdI said in a statement. EFE
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