ROME-- Police were investigating Thursday the manslaughter case of 54-year-old Senegalese street vendor, Nian Maguette, who died after fleeing from city police. Other African streetsellers blocked traffic on Lungotevere along banks of Tiber in protest of what they claimed was unlawful killing by police.

 Preliminary investigations suggest that the Senegalese national died from natural causes, maybe a heart attack.  

 The episode happened on Wednesday afternoon in the Lungotevere de’ Cenci area during a police raid on illegal street vendors. Police have denied that Maguette was being pursued, while some testimonies said that the man was “hit by a policeman on a motorbike.”

 The public minister Francesco Marinaro will examine the autopsy results carried out by forensic scientists from Sapienza on Friday. 

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