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Jealous Italian admits burning homeless man alive

An Italian who doused a homeless man in petrol and set him alight as he slept has confessed to the killing, telling police he acted out of jealousy.

Published: 12 March 2017 12:32 CET

Jealous Italian admits burning homeless man alive

Stefano79/Depositphotos

Giuseppe Pecoraro, a petrol pump attendant, admitted the attack on Saturday evening, less than 24 hours after Marcello Cimino burned to death outside a mission run by Capuccin monks in Palermo, Sicily.

“He thought that Cimino was after his wife,” local police chief Rodolfo Ruperti told reporters. “They had had a fight about her a few days earlier.”

Pecoraro was arrested with burns on his hands, apparently incurred during a fatal attack which was captured by security cameras and posted on the websites of several Italian media.

The video footage shows the hooded attacker approaching 45-year-old as he slept under heavy bedding in a portico outside the mission, which ran a soup kitchen for the homeless.

He empties a bucket of flammable liquid on to the bedding, takes a lighter from his pocket and sets it alight, sparking an instant blaze that the attacker only just escaped himself.

Neighbours heard the victim screaming but he was dead by the time emergency services arrived at the scene of a killing, which was described as “an act of pure barbarism” by Palermo Mayor Leoluca Orlando.

Cimino had ended up living on the streets after separating from his wife three years ago.

His killer, Pecoraro, has been charged with murder and a local prosecutor has also opened an investigation for breach of judicial secrecy over the leaking of the video footage to the media.

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The shocking stats that reveal the increasing number of homeless people dying in France

Photo: AFP

612

This is the official total for the number of homeless people who died in France in 2018, according to a new report by the French charity Morts de la Rue.

The figure represents those living either on the streets or in emergency shelters or unofficial squats in the months before they die. Some 20 percent of victims have been SDF (sans domicile fixe or homeless) for five years before their death.

In reality the real number is likely to be far higher. In fact health authorities in France suggest the true total could be as much as six times higher.

It can often be hard to determine an exact cause of death. Many homeless people suffer from illnesses and some 30 percent are addicted to alcohol or drugs. The suicide rate among homeless people is higher than average and violent attacks and accidents are also behind some of the deaths.

19 percent

This represents the percentage increase in the number of deaths between 2018 and 2017, when there were 511 recorded deaths of homeless people.

That represents the biggest jump in recent years but the number of deaths have been steadily rising since 2013 when there were 461 recorded.

50 percent

According to Morts de la Rue, 50 percent of the homeless people who die do so “before our eyes”, in other words on the streets in full view of the public.

48.7

That's the average age of the homeless men who died last year, well below France's average life expectancy which currently stands at 82 years.

14 percent

Some 14 percent of those homeless people who die are from around Europe. Indeed less than half are French, according to stats from Morts de la Rue.

Some 20 percent of victims are from outside the EU and 25 percent are registered as “unknown origin”.

13

The number of those who die on the streets of France or in shelters also include minors. Last year there were 13 homeless people who died under the age of 18.

90 percent

While 90 percent of the victims are men, there are an increasing number of women.

“Homeless women are often invisible, face particular difficulties related to gender, and suffer from violence during their life on the street,” said the authors of the study.

Between 2013 and 2018, 280 homeless women died at an average age of just over 46 years old. That number included 24 young women including children under the age of nine. One third of those homeless women who died were mothers with young children.

So what needs to be done?

As part of his presidential election campaign Emmanuel Macron promised to provide a roof over the head of every single person in France. But the government has a lot of work to do before his promise is fulfilled.

Nevertheless the charity Morts de la Rue insists “a home for everyone” must be the ultimate goal for authorities.

“Having a place to live is vital,” say Morts de la Rue.

“We can see that the impact on people of their time spent on the streets – mostly the effect on their physical and mental health which makes reintegration more difficult and even impossible over time,” the study said.

But in the meantime the charity is demanding a new major government study into homelessness. The last one carried out by the state's statistics agency INSEE was back in 2012.

The charity also insists that there must be consistency in the emergency accommodation offered to homeless people, whether it's the night shelters or the temporary homeless accommodation that opens in the winter months but closes in the spring.

Homeless people must be offered shelter all year round, the charity says, to provide them with a base and some stability.

Homeless people also need to be followed more closely by health and social agencies especially after they have spent time in hospital. Often they are not offered any help at vital times such as the period between leaving hospital and waiting to being given temporary accommodation in a shelter.

Police and the courts also need to be made much more aware of the impact of domestic violence on women.

“If they are better protected, they will not be forced to flee their own homes to escape the violence that they endure,” added Morts de la Rue.

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