1980
November 26, Milan
Ezio Lucarelli, 35 years old, Sergeant of the Carabinieri
Sergeant Ezio Lucarelli was killed in Milan on November 26, 1980 while, along with other members of the Carabinieri, conducting a search at an auto body shop as part of an investigation into a kidnapping. While the soldiers were in the process of identifying those present, two young men opened fire, killing Sergeant Lucarelli and injuring another member of the team. Trials will ascertain that those responsible for the act were members of the Nuclei Armati Rivoluzionari (NAR), who had committed a robbery for self-financing a few days earlier in Treviso. Sergeant Lucarelli was posthumously awarded the Gold Medal for Civil Valor. This is how Nicola Rao reconstructs the episode in the book “Il piombo e la Celtica.”
The reasons for the murder of Ezio Lucarelli
A week later, on November 26, Gilberto Cavallini arrives in Milan from Veneto and urgently needs to repair his car. So, together with Soderini, he goes to a trusted friend: Cosimo Simone, who owns a body shop in Lambrate. But at that moment, a carabinieri car arrives for a check as part of the investigation into a kidnapping.
Cavallini travels under a false name. Until then, no one had ever suspected or accused him of being part of the NAR. He is “only” wanted for escaping after his conviction for killing a comrade in Milan years earlier. But the car he is traveling in is the Audi 100 belonging to his Venetian woman: Flavia Sbrojavacca. If the carabinieri discover this, his cover is blown.
So, he doesn’t think twice and, when he sees that the military are about to transmit the car’s data via radio, he shoots at them. Sergeant Ezio Lucarelli dies. Marshal Giuseppe Palermo is injured. But during Cavallini and Soderini’s escape, they drop the documents they had given to the carabinieri. At that point, their names and faces become public.
NAR, a group in disarray
By now, the group is on the run. In recent months, the NAR have killed both police officers and soldiers. So, the police and carabinieri have put them at the top of the wanted list. Now, they are the target. At this point, Operation Concutelli is definitively abandoned. The only thing left to do is to hide, accumulate money, and leave. Perhaps abroad. Francesca Mambro: “In January 1981, we had decided to leave the country, also because, after the murder at the auto body shop in Milan, Cavallini’s network had collapsed, both in Lombardy and Veneto. At that point, his true identity had been discovered because the carabinieri had recovered the documents he had left in the workshop.”