PALERMO, Sicily – Italian journalist, Rosetta Puccio’s family car was set on fire on Saturday night. The journalist has already been victim of aggression while reporting on slum evictions in the Barcarello bay area in Palermo, back in 2020.

 CCTV, shared by ANSA, show a man getting closer to the car, a Kia Picanto, and pouring the contents of a bottle on it, which allegedly triggered the fire.

 “Rosella Puccio writes for many newspapers, with courage and fairness, and this same courage and fairness is seen as unacceptable to those who don’t want to free information,” said Giuseppe Rizzuto, the secretary of the Sicilian Journalists Trade Union and Claudia Brunetto, the secretary of the Sicilian Reporters Union. 

 In “Palermo Today”, one of the newspapers with whom Puccio collaborates, the journalist stated “the circumstance I believe requires more in-depth investigations, to fully understand the reasons behind such act and to identify who is responsible for it. I ask once again for the area (where the event took place) to be enhanced with more cameras, lights, and overall, more authority surveillance, since it is an area of high delinquency risk.”

 The journalist is not unfamiliar with such events. About ten years ago, the same car that was lit on fire on Saturday night, was targeted  – all four tires were slashed. More recently, in 2020, while reporting on the eviction of a slum from Palermo’s Bay of Barcarello, Puccio, was kicked and punched by numerous people; seven of which have been identified and committed to trial.

 The journalist is now assisted by the attorney Serena Romano, the ONLUS “Oxygen for Information” and by the “Sicilian Association of Journalists”, who will participate in the trial as a civil party.

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