Young American’s Term for Cop’s Homicide Cut

Rome: A Rome court on Tuesday reduced the jail term of Gabriele Natale Hjorth, one of two young Americans convicted of the homicide of Carabinieri police officer Mario Cerciello Rega in the Italian capital in July 2019, from 11 years, four months to 10 years, 11 months and 25 days.

According to Ansa News Agency, the other man convicted of the killing, Finnegan Lee Elder, is serving a definitive term of 15 years, two months. Elder was found guilty of killing Cerciello Rega with 11 stab wounds inflicted by a combat knife he had brought over from the US, while Natale Hjorth assaulted the slain officer’s partner during a chain of events sparked by a drug deal that went wrong.

Tuesday’s ruling was the third time Natale Hjorth’s case was addressed at the appeals-court level. In March, the supreme Court of Cassation upheld the conviction but sent the case back to the appeals court to determine whether the jail term should be reduced.

Last year, a court granted a request from Natale Hjorth to be released from jail to serve his sentence under house arrest at his grandmother’s home in Fregene, a town on the coast near Rome. Natale Hjorth and Elder were both initially given life prison terms in the trial of first instance, but those sentences were gradually reduced during the appeals process.