The autopsy examination already ordered by the Castrovillari prosecutor’s office will ascertain the causes of the death of Cataldo De Luca, 41 years old, from Cirò Marina, found dead this morning in a cell of the Rossano prison where he had been transferred just four days ago. That is, since the man had been served with a precautionary custody order issued on charges of aggravated voluntary manslaughter. De Luca, in fact, was considered the material perpetrator of the fatal attack on another inmate, Antonio Pugliese, 46 years old, also from Cirò Marina, which occurred on 7 July 2024 in the “Ugo Caridi” prison in Catanzaro.
For the same crime, on charges of complicity, the precautionary measure was also served on four other inmates of the same prison: Vincenzo Malena, 46 years old, from Cirò Marina; Dimitar Dimitrov Todorov, 29 year old originally from Bulgaria but resident in Crotone; Gianluca La Forgia, 42 years old, from Crotone and Francesco Molinaro, 43 years old, originally from Lamezia Terme. According to the reconstruction of the investigators, De Luca would have brutally beaten Pugliese with kicks and punches in reaction to a slap that the victim, apparently impaired by alcohol, had given him previously. In the Catanzaro prison Pugliese was serving a 25-year sentence for another murder, that of Nicodemo Aloe, murdered on the evening of 24 May 2015 in Cirò Marina with 5 gunshots in front of the garage he had used as a home.