1974

8 September, Rome
Fabrizio Ceruso, 19 years old, student

The fight for the right to housing is very strong in Rome when, on 5 September, in the hamlet of San Basilio, on the extreme eastern outskirts of the capital, the police intervened with a huge deployment, starting to evict the almost 150 families who for about a year they occupy the same number of IACP apartments in via Montecarotto and via Fabriano. The meeting between the determined popular opposition to the evictions and the will of the militants of the revolutionary left to defend one of the most extensive occupations taking place in the city leads to the organization of a harsh resistance, which leads to real street battles. Since the early hours of the morning of Friday 6 September, barricades have been erected at the entrances to the neighborhood with tyres, old furniture and objects of all kinds. The police, greeted by stones, incendiary bottles, bolts thrown with slingshots, fired hundreds of tear gas canisters, but in the afternoon were forced to suspend the evictions. On Saturday 7th, while the occupiers had taken back all the apartments and one of their delegations went to the magistrates’ court and to the IACP, evictions were attempted again. This time there are hundreds of protesters from all over the city resisting, including numerous members of works councils. The day passes in a succession of “truces”, granted by the police to Lotta Continua, which manages the occupation, to give space to what will prove to be a scam-negotiation, with the sole aim of gaining time and weakening the strong alignment proletarian. The delegation returns to San Basilio with an agreement to suspend evictions until Monday morning. Despite this, on Sunday the 8th the police broke into occupied houses again. The clashes resume. The popular assembly in the central square of the village, organized for 6pm by the San Basilio Housing Committee, was fired at eye level with tear gas canisters. In the battle that follows, while one police platoon is forced to retreat, numerous shots are fired from another. Fabrizio Ceruso, 19 years old, militant of the Proletarian Committee of Tivoli, an organization of Workers’ Autonomy, is hit in the chest by a bullet. Loaded into a taxi, he arrives lifeless at the hospital. Upon hearing the news of the young communist’s death, the entire neighborhood takes to the streets. Anger explodes violently. The street lamp poles are torn down and the streets are left dark. This time it is the police who are targeted by gunshots fired into the streets and from houses. Eight policemen, including a captain, were injured, some seriously. Brief isolated clashes flare up late into the night.