A high-profile food safety case is making headlines in South Korea, where the owner of an elite two-Michelin-starred Seoul restaurant is facing steep legal penalties after being charged with serving unapproved ants as a gourmet dessert topping. Local media outlets have confirmed that state prosecutors are pushing for a 12-month prison sentence and a 20 million Korean won (equivalent to roughly $13,510) fine against the unnamed eatery owner, whose menu included ant-topped sorbet that violates the country’s strict food safety regulations. Under South Korean law, only 10 specific insect species are cleared for human consumption – a list that includes grasshoppers, locusts, and two-spotted crickets, but excludes all ant varieties. The case first came to the attention of food safety regulators after Ministry of Food and Drug Safety officials stumbled across customer reviews posted online, paired with photos of restaurant dishes visibly sprinkled with whole ants. Subsequent investigations by authorities have revealed that over a four-year period, the restaurant imported approximately 49,000 ants from suppliers based in the United States and Thailand to incorporate into multiple menu items. Most notably, testing from South Korean health regulators found that the ants used by the restaurant contained dangerously high levels of heavy metals – as much as 55 times the concentration allowed for commercially sold edible insects, local newspaper The Chosun Daily reported. In court, the restaurant owner has mounted a defense pushing for leniency, acknowledging that ants did appear on the menu but arguing their use was extremely limited. The ants only featured as a topping for sorbet in the restaurant’s 15-course tasting menu, he explained, and all guests were explicitly notified that they could request an alternative topping if they preferred not to eat ants. The owner further noted that roughly 40% of diners opted out of the ant topping entirely, receiving fermented vinegar or edible flowers instead, and that using ants as a gourmet ingredient is common practice at high-end restaurants in other countries including Australia, Denmark, and the United Kingdom. South Korea’s formal approval process for edible insects weighs multiple key criteria before clearing an insect species for commercial use, including potential food safety hazards, inherent toxicity, nutritional value, and the ability to breed and process the insects consistently under hygienic conditions. While the case has not named the specific restaurant or its owner, there are only 10 two-Michelin-starred restaurants across South Korea, all of which are based in Seoul. For context, the Michelin Guide’s globally recognized rating system awards up to three stars to restaurants based on rigorous assessment of ingredient quality, flavor consistency, technical cooking skill, and the chef’s unique creative vision. Two stars, the rating held by the restaurant at the center of this case, indicate the establishment serves “excellent cooking” that is “worth a detour” per Michelin’s official criteria. It is worth noting that ants have a long history as a traditional food source across many global cultures, valued as a delicacy in multiple regions of Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Weaver ants and their eggs are a common ingredient in traditional Thai and Cambodian cuisine, for example, and queen ants are considered a luxury ingredient on par with caviar in parts of Colombia. Now, the Seoul court hearing the case is scheduled to issue its final verdict on September 2, with the outcome expected to set a clear precedent for how South Korean regulators handle unconventional gourmet ingredients that fall outside of existing approved food frameworks.
分类： society
-
Gruesome images in D4vd hearing are ‘worst nightmare’ for teen girl’s family
On the opening day of a high-profile preliminary murder case against 21-year-old rising singer David Anthony Burke, known professionally by his stage name D4vd, prosecutors presented gruesome, never-before-publicly-seen evidence of 14-year-old victim Celeste Rivas Hernandez’s dismembered remains — forcing the teen’s grieving parents to confront horrific details of their daughter’s death in a packed Los Angeles downtown courtroom.
Prosecutors laid out graphic photographs of Celeste’s body, which was discovered last September inside the trunk of a Tesla registered to Burke at a Hollywood tow yard. The photos, which had only previously been referenced in sealed court filings, marked the first time the physical evidence was displayed publicly during the hearing, which will determine whether there is sufficient proof to move the case to a full jury trial.
According to lead homicide detective Joshua Byers’ testimony, online purchase records show Burke ordered a collection of disturbing items just days after Celeste’s death: a heavy-duty body bag, multiple chainsaws, a large inflatable pool, and a shovel, all of which were delivered to his home address under a false name. Prosecutors allege these items were purchased specifically to dismember Celeste’s body and cover up the killing.
Prosecutors’ narrative of the crime alleges that Burke, who had sexually abused Celeste over a period of years, murdered her to protect his burgeoning multi-million dollar music career. They claim he stabbed the 14-year-old to death after she threatened to expose their inappropriate relationship, then dismembered her body with a chainsaw to hide evidence of the killing. Burke has formally pleaded not guilty to all charges of murder and aggravated sexual abuse.
For Celeste’s family, the first day of the hearing was an unimaginable ordeal, according to their attorney Patrick Steinfeld, who spoke with reporters after the session wrapped. Steinfeld said he had warned both parents that viewing the graphic evidence would leave an indelible, traumatic mark, and offered them the option to step out of the courtroom during the presentation of photographs. Celeste’s mother, Mercedes Hernandez, insisted on staying, telling her lawyer she wanted to be present to stand with her daughter.
“This is the first time they’ve heard this evidence in detail, and they’re horrified,” Steinfeld told the BBC. “There was an image of Celeste’s torso and her head in the trunk of the car, and the prosecutor had to ask what it was because you could not tell it was a head. It was absolutely deplorable. They’re at a loss for words and they’re just trying to do the best they can.” Steinfeld added that Mercedes Hernandez broke down crying immediately after seeing the images, and that the experience has been “a parent’s worst nightmare” for the intensely private family.
Lead prosecutor Beth Silverman repeatedly paused before displaying each graphic photograph, turning to Celeste’s parents to warn them of the content and offer them the chance to look away. At multiple points during the evidence presentation, Mercedes was comforted by supporters seated beside her in the courtroom gallery.
Detective Byers told the court that when he first opened the locked trunk of the Tesla at the tow yard, he found a sealed cadaver bag containing heavily decomposed remains: a severed torso and head, with a second black garbage bag holding additional dismembered limbs tucked underneath. Due to the advanced state of decomposition, Byers testified, Celeste’s face was no longer identifiable when her body was found.
Additional physical evidence presented on Tuesday linked Burke directly to the victim, the court heard. Prosecutors displayed photographs of two tattoos on Burke’s hands: a red-ink rendering of “Celeste” on his left ring finger, and a tattoo reading “Shhh…” on his right index finger. Matching photos showed Celeste had an identical “Shhh…” tattoo on her right index finger, and prosecutors also presented a photograph of a severed hand found with Celeste’s remains that included the ring and little finger.
The small Los Angeles courtroom was filled to capacity long before the hearing got underway Tuesday. Members of the press, independent content creators from YouTube and TikTok, and curious members of the public entered a public lottery to win one of the limited number of public seats, and a tense, anticipatory hush fell over the room when Burke was led into the courtroom. Clad in a standard-issue orange jail uniform and shackled at the wrists and ankles, Burke remained chained to his defense table throughout the entire proceeding. He offered a brief smile to his legal team before responding politely to the judge’s opening comments, and otherwise remained quiet during the day’s testimony.
The preliminary hearing is scheduled to continue over multiple additional days, with prosecutors set to call additional witnesses to build their case that sufficient evidence exists to move the murder case to a full jury trial.
-
‘My sister is not just another statistic’ – Jennie’s Law is signed
In the Republic of Ireland, a landmark piece of domestic violence reform legislation named for a young Dublin mother killed by her former partner has been formally signed into law, turning a family’s devastating grief into a systemic change designed to prevent future femicides.
In April 2021, 24-year-old Jennifer Poole – a mother of two young children – was fatally stabbed seven times by her ex-partner Gavin Murphy in her Dublin home. Murphy, who would later plead guilty to murder and receive a life sentence in 2022, held a concealed violent criminal history: in 2015, he had served two years in prison for a knife attack on a previous partner and her mother. When Poole began dating Murphy in 2020, neither she nor her family had any knowledge of this prior domestic violence conviction. Covid-19 restrictions limited the family’s contact with Murphy early in the relationship, and by the time Poole began showing unexplained bruises and withdrawing from her loved ones, the harm was already escalating. One week before her murder, Poole had ended the relationship, but Murphy attacked her before she could escape the danger he posed.
Jason Poole, Jennifer’s brother, has spent nearly five years campaigning tirelessly for reform after his sister’s death. He rejected the idea that Jennifer would become just another overlooked statistic in Ireland’s crisis of gender-based violence, and began meeting with lawmakers to draft proposals for greater transparency around domestic violence offenders. On Tuesday, that campaign reached its milestone when the Domestic Violence (Judgements) Register Bill 2026 – widely known as Jennie’s Law – was approved by Ireland’s Dáil parliament and signed into law by President Catherine Connolly.
Unlike the UK’s Clare’s Law, a “right to ask” framework that allows potential victims to request police disclosure of a partner’s abusive history but has faced criticism for inconsistent disclosure, Jennie’s Law establishes a fully public, searchable register hosted on the Irish Courts Service website. All offenders convicted of domestic violence against a current or former romantic partner will be added to the register, with the caveat that victims must provide written consent before a perpetrator’s name is published – a provision designed to center survivor autonomy and safety. Jason Poole emphasized that this transparency would have saved his sister’s life: if the register had existed in 2020, Jennifer would have never entered the relationship that killed her, and his family would have never had to lay her to rest in Dublin’s Glasnevin Cemetery.
“Now we have a legacy that her children will know that their mummy didn’t die in vain,” Jason Poole told reporters. “It’s to support victims, it’s to support families that are not going to have to suffer like we have had to suffer and continue to suffer, because we didn’t know how we could help Jennifer, we didn’t know his past.” For Jason, the passage of the law marks the end of a long, painful campaign, and opens the door for him to finally process his grief: “I am literally a brother who had no choice but to go and see their sister being laid into the ground because of failures in a system that wasn’t there to protect her. And now that those systems are there, hopefully the less work I’ll have to do and I can get on and actually start my grief.”
The reform has already drawn attention across the Irish border, where domestic violence advocates are calling for Northern Ireland to adopt a similar public register framework. Nuala Lappin, a former domestic violence officer with the Police Service of Northern Ireland, told *The Nolan Show* that Jennie’s Law is far more proactive than the region’s existing Clare’s Law-style framework. “It empowers victims and potential victims to find out for themselves and make those decisions early on; Clare’s Law in my view is more reactive than preventative,” Lappin said. Northern Ireland Justice Minister Naomi Long responded that officials are “closely” watching the implementation of Jennie’s Law in the Republic of Ireland, and are keeping an open mind to adopting similar legislation, noting that policymakers will need to carefully evaluate issues of proportionality around public disclosure of offender details before moving forward.
-
Tokyo urges men to wear shorts to work, but women say it’s ‘leg hair harassment’
As Japan grapples with one of its most punishing summer heatwaves in recent history, a bold workplace policy from the Tokyo Metropolitan Government has split public opinion: encouraging male office workers to trade tailored suit trousers for casual shorts to beat soaring temperatures.
First conceptualized by current Tokyo Governor Yuriko Koike back in 2005 during her tenure as Japan’s Environment Minister, the Cool Biz initiative has evolved into a decades-long annual summer tradition. Koike originally launched the national program to cut energy consumption by prompting workers to adopt lighter, cooler attire, starting with short-sleeve shirts instead of formal long sleeves. After the 2011 Tohoku earthquake and tsunami disrupted national energy supplies, the initiative expanded into Super Cool Biz, which relaxed dress codes further to cut power use across workplaces and households. This April, Koike’s administration rolled out the latest iteration: *Tokyo Cool Biz*, which explicitly allows and encourages men to wear shorts in office settings to cope with extreme heat.
Nearly four months after the policy launched, public reaction has been deeply divided. Proponents argue that looser dress rules make long workdays in sweltering conditions far more comfortable, boosting productivity and reducing heat-related health risks. But critics have raised pointed concerns about gender inequity: many note that women are still widely expected to wear opaque tights if they show any leg at work, placing an unfair comfort and compliance burden on female employees that men do not face. The policy has also sparked an unexpected cultural conversation around “sunehara” — a newly coined online term translating to “leg hair harassment” — that describes the discomfort many women feel when forced to view unshaven male legs in shared office spaces.
Officials behind the initiative emphasize that its core goal is expanding choice, not mandating a specific wardrobe. “We want to give people more options in the severe heat, not tell them what to wear,” Noboru Watanabe, an environmental official with the Tokyo Metropolitan Government, told the BBC. “There should be no issue as long as the work attire is not offensive to anyone.”
Still, polling reflects the sharp divide in public opinion. A June survey conducted by Gorilla Clinic, a Japanese aesthetic medical provider, found that 53.5% of respondents opposed allowing shorts in summer workplaces, while 46.5% supported the new recommendation. For opponents of both genders, the top concerns centered on exposed body hair and body insecurities. The clinic noted that women responded to the survey in far higher numbers than men, indicating that female workers are disproportionately resistant to the shift to casual office shorts.
The policy has even created unexpected demand for aesthetic services. Akifumi Funatsu, Gorilla Clinic’s director, reports a sharp uptick in male clients seeking laser leg hair removal. What was once a purely cosmetic choice has become framed as a matter of workplace social etiquette, Funatsu explained, as many men internalize the widespread expectation that women prefer men to have minimal leg hair, and want to avoid making colleagues uncomfortable.
While the shorts policy has dominated public conversation around this year’s Cool Biz, it comes amid far more serious heat-related challenges facing Japan. Like much of the world, Japan has recorded record-breaking high temperatures in recent months, compounded by soaring global energy prices driven by Middle Eastern geopolitical instability. The Japan Meteorological Agency has even introduced a new term, *kokusho-bi*, or “brutally hot day,” to alert the public when temperatures exceed 40°C, in a push to raise awareness of deadly heat risks.
Official data underscores the severity of the threat: between July 6 and 12, seven people died from heatstroke and 4,580 were hospitalized across the country, according to Japan’s Fire and Disaster Management Agency. Beyond encouraging basic precautions like regular hydration and adjusted air conditioner use, Japanese residents have turned to a growing market of heat-fighting gadgets, from fan-embedded clothing and disposable cooling towels to heat-blocking umbrellas and portable handheld fans, all of which have sold out at many retailers nationwide.
Disaster reduction experts stress that proactive preparation is key to avoiding heat illness. Researchers with the Japan Academic Network for Disaster Reduction note that the human body requires several weeks to build heat acclimatization, so the best time to start preventive measures is during the country’s rainy season, before peak summer heat sets in. They add that Japan’s uniquely high humidity makes heat even more dangerous, as it slows sweat evaporation and undermines the body’s natural ability to cool itself.
While casual workplace attire has slowly gained traction in Japan over recent years — particularly in startups and tech firms — this year’s Tokyo government recommendation has normalized the shift for traditional industries. For many Japanese workers, adapting to hotter summers means not just changing what they wear to the office, but navigating new social expectations around professional appearance in a warming climate.
-
‘He launched me in the air’ – Grandfather recounts terrifying Yellowstone Park bison attack
A 65-year-old survivor of a brutal Yellowstone National Park bison attack is sharing his harrowing experience to warn other visitors after walking away with life-altering injuries. Carl Isom-McDaniel, who is currently recovering from surgery at Bozeman Health in Montana, described the chaotic moment when the 2,000-pound animal singled him out as a target during a mid-July visit.
Isom-McDaniel’s July 10 encounter quickly went viral after footage of the incident circulated online. The clip shows the retiree and his grandson pausing to snap a photo of the bison, which appeared resting near a tree. Moments later, the massive animal sprang to its feet, immediately began charging, and launched Isom-McDaniel into the air before he could escape.
In a roughly three-minute interview video released by the hospital, Isom-McDaniel reflected on the near-death experience from his hospital bed. “Even though I was on the ground, he could have stomped me, he could have gored me, he could have done anything,” he recalled. “He wasn’t showing aggression or anything like that until it picked a target. That target happened to be me.” Contrary to common assumptions, the retireo said the bison’s initial impact was not the source of his severe injury – instead, the hard landing after being thrown into the air caused the extensive damage to his hip.
Dr. Eric Lowe, a treating physician at Bozeman Health, confirmed the severity of Isom-McDaniel’s injury, pointing to X-ray scans that show the hip broken into multiple fragments. “It was definitely clear that he had a pretty painful injury,” Lowe noted, highlighting the clear fracture lines and loose bone fragments visible in the imaging.
Wildlife experts explain that even though the pair appeared to maintain a safe distance in footage of the attack, the timing of the incident put them at heightened risk. The attack took place during bison mating season, a period when male bison experience elevated testosterone levels and far higher levels of aggression than usual.
The National Park Service has long warned visitors about the underestimated danger bison pose in the park. Its official website notes that while bison often appear slow and docile to tourists, they have injured more people in Yellowstone than any other native animal species. The agency mandates that all visitors stay at least 25 yards (23 meters) away from bison at all times, and explicitly prohibits approaching the animals to capture photos, a rule that many tourists overlook for the sake of a viral snapshot.
-
Trial opens for US mum who says postpartum issues led her to killing own children
Jury selection is officially underway in Plymouth, Massachusetts, for one of the most high-profile and heart-wrenching criminal cases in recent U.S. history, centered on 32-year-old Lindsay Clancy, a woman accused of murdering her three young children in 2023. The case has already sparked widespread public debate around postpartum mental health care, the medical system’s response to severe perinatal psychiatric conditions, and the ethics of the insanity defense in cases of profound mental illness.
Prosecutors building the commonwealth’s case against Clancy argue the killings were carefully premeditated and carried out intentionally. According to court documents and investigative records, prosecutors allege Clancy deliberately arranged to send her husband, Patrick Clancy, on errands out of the family home, timing his absence to guarantee she would have unbroken alone time with the couple’s three children: 5-year-old Cora, 3-year-old Dawson, and 8-month-old Callan. Investigators have confirmed Clancy checked in advance how long Patrick’s errands would take, confirming she would have sufficient time to carry out the act before he returned.
Clancy has entered a formal plea of not guilty to all three charges of murder. Her defense team has not contested that she was responsible for the children’s deaths; instead, their core argument is that Clancy was not legally culpable for her actions due to a severe, untreated episode of postpartum psychosis that robbed her of the ability to discern right from wrong. They are mounting an insanity defense, centered on the claim that Clancy experienced debilitating delusions and command hallucinations in the weeks leading up to the deaths, all tied to the postpartum psychiatric condition she had been seeking care for months.
The same night the children were killed, Clancy attempted to end her own life. The suicide attempt left her permanently paralyzed, and she has since received ongoing mental health treatment at a state psychiatric facility between court appearances.
The case extends far beyond the criminal trial: earlier this year, Clancy and her husband filed a civil lawsuit against her former medical providers, alleging the team failed to properly diagnose, treat, and monitor her severe postpartum psychiatric condition, despite repeated warnings that her symptoms were worsening. Court filings in the civil suit detail that Clancy took every possible step to access care in the weeks before the tragedy: she self-admitted to a psychiatric facility for several days just weeks before the killings, sought help from emergency rooms, called crisis hotlines, followed all prescribed medication instructions, and repeatedly told her providers that her symptoms were growing more dangerous, even that her medication was making her state worse. She reported persistent insomnia and that she heard constant voices in her head commanding her to harm both herself and her children. The lawsuit states, “Lindsay Clancy did everything a mother in her situation could do” to get help.
In the aftermath of the killings, Patrick Clancy shared a public statement in a GoFundMe fundraiser organized to cover legal and medical costs, asking the public to see his wife as he does. He described her as a deeply loving, caring person who had dedicated her life to supporting others, writing, “The real Lindsay was generously loving and caring toward everyone — me, our kids, family, friends, and her patients. The very fibers of her soul are loving. All I wish for her now is that she can somehow find peace.”
Medical experts define postpartum psychosis as a rare but life-threatening emergency mental health condition that develops shortly after childbirth, distinct from the common, mild “baby blues” that many new parents experience. The UK’s National Health Service emphasizes it requires immediate, urgent medical intervention to prevent harm to the parent and child.
As of Monday, five of the 18 jurors required for the full trial panel have been seated. Dozens of witnesses are expected to testify over the course of the trial, including Patrick Clancy. For anyone experiencing suicidal thoughts or perinatal mental distress, support resources are available globally through Befrienders Worldwide, with additional resources listed for UK residents via BBC Action Line.
A makeshift memorial of flowers and handwritten notes has already been placed outside the Clancy family home, a quiet testament to the profound grief that has surrounded the case from its beginning.
-
2 firefighters die in a building fire near France’s Bordeaux airport, flights delayed
A tragic incident unfolded in southwest France on Tuesday, claiming the lives of two professional firefighters who were responding to an urban building fire. The fatal development was confirmed by France’s Interior Minister Laurent Nunez during an official address to lawmakers assembled at the National Assembly, where he first shared the grim news of the on-duty deaths.
The blaze broke out in Mérignac, a suburban community that borders the major southwestern city of Bordeaux and is home to Bordeaux’s main international airport. At the time of the announcement, Nunez told legislators that full details of the fire’s origin, spread, and the circumstances surrounding the firefighters’ deaths were still being compiled by emergency response authorities, and he could not yet share additional concrete information about the incident.
Officials managing Bordeaux-Mérignac Airport issued a public advisory via the facility’s official website shortly after the fire started, noting that the emergency response effort and the proximity of the blaze to airport operations had led to delays for a number of departing and arriving flights. No further details about the extent of the delays or the number of affected passengers were immediately released by airport management.
-
Watch rescuers save missing dog from San Francisco Bay
A tense and heart-stopping incident unfolded on the waters of San Francisco Bay recently, when a team of rescuers launched a rapid mission to recover a missing canine that had ended up stranded in the chilly open water.
Eyewitness footage captured the urgent pace of the operation, as the rescue team powered their small boats across the bay’s surface, closing the distance between them and the struggling animal. When they reached the dog, one rescuer executed a daring one-handed reach over the side of their vessel, successfully snatching the shaken pup from the water before it could face further peril.
The incident has drawn wide attention online, with members of the public praising the rescuers’ fast action and steady nerve that gave the missing dog a second chance at life. Local authorities have not yet released further details on how the dog came to be in the bay, or whether it has been reunited with its owners as of the latest updates.
-
Watch: US police officer pulls man from burning car
Dramatic footage captured by both a police officer’s body-worn camera and a patrol car dashcam documents a harrowing last-second rescue that unfolded on a road in Texas, where a law enforcement officer pulled a trapped motorist out of his vehicle just moments before it was completely consumed by fire.
The incident, which unfolded in the south-central US state, showcases the quick thinking and courage of the responding officer, who did not hesitate to approach the already-smoldering vehicle to extract the driver before the blaze could spread. The overlapping angles from the two camera systems provide a complete, unfiltered view of the emergency response: from the officer’s arrival on scene to the urgent efforts to free the driver, followed immediately by the car bursting into full flames seconds after the rescue was completed.
Local audiences have seen the raw footage released by law enforcement agencies, highlighting the split-second decisions that police officers often face when responding to life-threatening roadside emergencies. While further details about the cause of the vehicle fire and the driver’s condition have not been fully released in the initial reporting, the footage stands as a clear record of an act of quick bravery that saved a man’s life.
-
Dozens hurt in Bologna protests after man dies while being restrained by police
The death of Abderrahim Fakir, a Moroccan-born long-term Italian resident, while in police restraint in the northern Italian city of Bologna has triggered large-scale public protests and reopened heated national debates over police use of force, racial justice, and law enforcement accountability. The incident began on a Sunday morning, when a neighbor in the working-class Pilastro neighborhood called police to report that Fakir was acting erratically and kicking local garage doors. When officers arrived at the scene, they first attempted to de-escalate the situation before deploying pepper spray to subdue him.
Circulated widely across Italian media, a graphic video of the encounter captures the moments after Fakir was forced to the ground. The footage shows two uniformed police officers pinning Fakir to the pavement while he lies face down, repeatedly crying out for the officers to stop holding him. A third civilian bystander assisted officers by holding down Fakir’s legs, as emergency medical personnel stood by nearby. Roughly two minutes into the recording, Fakir ceases all movement. After binding his wrists and ankles, one officer noticed Fakir was unresponsive and slapped him twice on the cheek in an attempt to rouse him. By the time ambulance workers stepped in to assess him, Fakir was already fully unconscious and could not be revived.
In the wake of his death, Bologna prosecutors have opened a formal manslaughter investigation targeting both the responding police officers and the medical personnel present at the scene. Multiple eyewitnesses have told local media that while Fakir was clearly experiencing mental distress at the time of the encounter, he never threatened any bystanders and was completely unarmed. For Fakir’s family, the incident has been an unfathomable loss, and they are demanding full accountability for his death. “You can’t die like this,” his sister Khadija Fakir told reporters. “They killed him mercilessly, and I want the truth.” Speaking at a public demonstration Monday evening, his niece Yossra Fakir pushed back against efforts to reduce her uncle to a headline. “He wasn’t a number, he wasn’t a news line… he was loved,” she said. “He deserved to be helped and heard, and he deserved dignity.”
Bologna’s mayor Matteo Lepore joined widespread public outrage, noting that anyone who viewed the restraint video would be deeply shocked by what they saw. He organized a mass peaceful demonstration in central Bologna on Monday night to call for transparency, and invited members of Fakir’s family to speak alongside him on stage. The demonstration drew thousands of attendees who marched peacefully demanding justice for Abderrahim Fakir, but the event fractured late in the night when a group of roughly 100 protesters split off from the main crowd. Clashes broke out between this splinter faction and police, and two vehicles were set on fire before order was restored. Official reports confirm that 64 police officers were injured during the overnight unrest.
In the aftermath of the protests and violence, Italian political leaders have offered starkly different responses. Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, head of the current right-wing government, emphasized that a full investigation into the circumstances of Fakir’s death was mandatory to uncover the full truth, but added that “nothing can justify violence against law enforcement.” She condemned the splinter group’s actions, saying “Those who chose to use this incident as a pretext to set the city ablaze, attack officers, and sow violence… were not seeking the truth: they were seeking confrontation.”
Domenico Pianese, secretary-general of Italy’s national police union, also criticized Lepore’s decision to call for a public demonstration the day after Fakir’s death, arguing that the timing opened the door for anti-police and pseudo-anarchist groups to exploit the tragedy for their own political gain. Defending the responding officers’ actions, Pianese claimed that the intervention shown in the video was carried out correctly. He argued that the fact officers needed to use pepper spray and request civilian assistance to restrain Fakir proved that the level of force used was not excessive, adding that officers had immediately turned over all body camera footage to prosecuting authorities as soon as the incident concluded.
Opposition political figures have pushed back against the government’s rhetoric and its show of solidarity with police, echoing public calls for full accountability. Ilaria Cucchi, a senator with the opposition Greens and Left Alliance whose own brother Stefano died in Italian police custody in 2009 — a case that became a national scandal — criticized the government’s positioning. Many protest signs carried at the Bologna demonstration explicitly referenced Stefano Cucchi’s case, linking Fakir’s death to a long history of controversial deaths in police custody in Italy. Center-left Democratic Party lawmaker Francesco Boccia also hit out at the government, accusing it of adopting heavy-handed U.S.-style immigration enforcement tactics that have led to unnecessary deaths.
Fakir, who was in his 50s, had been part of a Moroccan family that settled in Italy more than 30 years ago, and lived near Bologna for decades where he operated a small local logistics and delivery business. His immigration lawyer Barbara Spinelli remembered him as a kind, hardworking person, and wrote on social media: “[Fakir] was a hardworker, he was kind… Ask yourselves why he died in the hands of those who had an institutional duty to protect his life.” As the manslaughter investigation moves forward, Italy remains deeply divided over the incident and what it says about systemic issues in national law enforcement.