“We felt that same indignation — we saw Turin violated,” Carretta explained, but “restricting the possibility to demonstrate does not strike me as the best response.”
The images from the Jan. 31 violence spread on social media, with both sides accusing each other of brutality. In addition to the policeman struck with a hammer, a photographer alleged he was assailed by officers for taking pictures of one of their colleagues.
According Italo Di Sabato, coordinator at the Osservatorio Repressione, a civil society organization that promotes studies on repressive governance, the security decrees serve a specific purpose: “The Meloni government’s main action [is] an exercise in propaganda around the word ‘security’.”
While Meloni says she is working toward her idea of a state that “defends those who defend us and that restores security and freedom to citizens,” Di Sabato said her security package was actually an attempt to stir up a “perception of insecurity” across the country.
Based on the interior ministry’s own data, homicides were down 15 percent in 2025 compared with 2024, and ISTAT shows overall crime rates are at the same level as 2018, before the pandemic.
Carretta noted a fundamental flaw in the government’s argument, paraphrasing an allegory used by Turin Mayor Stefano Lo Russo: “I go to the stadium with my son, the ultras cause trouble, and what’s the response? To close the stadium? To criminalize everyone who was there for a sporting event?”
