Rome: Police officers, heroes of the past and the challenges of the present

Deputy Brigadier Pietro Ermelindo Lungaro was murdered at the Fosse Ardeatine Massacre on the outskirts of Rome, where 335 civilians and political prisoners were killed in reprisal by German occupation troops on March 24, 1944. Officers Emilio Scaglia and Giovanni Lupis found their deaths on June 3 at Forte Bravetta, just hours before the liberation of the capital. Three stumbling stones have been dedicated to these heroes of the Italian Resistance who fell at the hands of the Nazi-Fascists in front of the entrance to the city police headquarters.
“It is a contribution to the telling of historical facts, to encourage a collective reflection on the value of memory, which is guarded by these stones set where innocent men, women and children were snatched from life. It is a tangible symbol that holds names and stories, bearing witness to the past by inserting itself into the present,” Italian Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi said during the ceremony also attended by Questore Carmine Belfiore, Police Chief Vittorio Pisani, Prefect Lamberto Giannini, Mayor Roberto Gualtieri, UCEI President Noemi Di Segni, and Israel’s Ambassador to Italy Alon Bar.
The installation is part of a larger project to recover the historical memory of the police officers who played a significant role in saving Jews and did their best in the Liberation struggle “in the symbolic place of daily life: the home, workplace or office where they served.”
Expressing gratitude for the choices made then by the three policemen, the UCEI thanked law enforcement agencies for what they do “every hour and every day, in silence, with dedication and professionalism, far from the spotlight and in the fatigue that requires lucidity and constant concentration.” President Di Segni praised their actions in Italy and abroad, speaking of a “culture of life and responsibility that unites those who are part of the great family of the State Police.” An approach, she said, that should not be taken for granted “because we see in other places and contexts what it means to have an organized force for evil that instrumentalizes civilians”.