ROME – A young American on trial in Rome for the slaying of an Italian police officer has told the court that he stabbed the victim because he feared he was being strangled by a thug.
Finnegan Lee Elder, 21, and a friend from California, Gabriel Natale-Hjorth, 20, are charged in the murder of a Carabinieri paramilitary officer on a street near their hotel while vacationing in Rome in 2019.
Elder told the court that Vice Brigadier Mario Cerciello Rega had his hands pressing on Elder’s neck. So, the defendant contended, he reached for his knife and stabbed Cerciello, whom he said he mistook for a thug, in self-defense.