Rome, Esquilino: Major Police Operation, 16 Arrests.

With a door-to-door action the police officers pass by Colle Oppio neighborhood on the Esquiline Hill with an incessant extraordinary territorial control action aimed at multiple objectives ranging from combating petty crime, from robberies to thefts to drug-related crimes.

They are fifteen the latest profiles that have ended up in the sights of the State Police, each of which tells a fragment of the criminal mosaic that shapes the neighborhood: expert pushers, car thieves and inveterate pickpockets, often protagonists of episodes of resistance and violence against the police and citizens.

The incessant activity of the agents of the Esquilino State Police Station and the Flying Squad has led to the arrest of five robbers – between road professionals and neophytes – capable of moving, alone or in pairs, between the stalls of the local market and the gardens of Piazza Vittorio.

They coldly chose their victims from distracted tourists, lonely elderly people, and seemingly defenseless passers-by. Thus, in a few moments, they snatched their loot, usually a smartphone or wallet, and ran away, fearless in attacking them in case of a reaction.

The singular case of the victim identified in a “customer” who arrived at the market stalls with the intention of purchasing a dose of drugs. Once he had handed over the required banknote for the purchase, he expected the usual quick transfer, but instead of drugs, he found himself pointed a knife at you, extracted by the same pusher, who attempted to rob him by threatening him by chasing him among passers-by.

Stopped by the police after a strenuous resistance, the young man, a nineteen-year-old Tunisian, was arrested for the crimes of attempted aggravated robbery and resisting a public official.

They are five more the thieves ended up in handcuffs, specialized in rummaging through vans in stop and auto parked along the streets adjacent to the local market. Some were caught red-handed by the police, others were caught thanks to alert citizens.

There are just as many pushers neutralized by the agents, regular visitor to the gardens of Vittorio square, where they transformed benches into “sales points” and bushes into hiding places.

They used cigarette packs tucked between tree branches or hidden in socks, sold on a rotating basis to customers brought to the site by "lookouts" or collaborators who, like "tour guides" to the drug dealing, led them away from prying eyes to conclude the deal.

In more than one case, Some of the people targeted by the police have chosen the path of resistance, proving fearless in reacting with violence even against them in order to gain their escape.

To the number of those arrested, there is added a fifty-one year old who, after going into a rage inside a commercial establishment, had attacked the intervening officers, one of whom has been given a prognosis of being cured in seven days. The man is now seriously suspected of crimes of threats, injuries and resistance to a public official.

The controls implemented, which are part of a tailor-made strategy for the Esquilino neighborhood, will be repeated on a daily basis with the objective, shared within the Provincial Committee for Public Order and Safety, of to restore spaces of legality in an area affected by numerous phenomena of degradation.