"Monster of Florence, the Sardinian lead isn't a surprise: my father knew."

"Now every piece of the puzzle is in place, but it wouldn't have been a surprise to my father to learn that the DNA test on Natalino Mele leads to the Vinci family—that is, to the Sardinian trail, to Villacidro. My father always knew this and wrote to the Florence Prosecutor's Office in 1985, but other investigative decisions were made. One thing is certain: 30 years ago, Carabinieri Major Vincenzo Rosati understood that it was necessary to search for the Monster of Florence in Sardinia." Mario Rosati, speaking in his office in Tempio, is a lawyer, but above all, he is the son of the Carabinieri officer who put an end to the tragic series of murders that had occurred in the province of Florence since 1968.

Mario Rosati shows a substantial judicial report and says: "Of course, that's true. When, in the fall of 1985, my father, Vincenzo Rosati, arrived in Florence from Tempio, he and Colonel Torrisi immediately focused on the Sardinian lead. Based on this information, Vinci was arrested a few months later. Since then, the 'monster' hasn't struck again. And in recent days, the so-called Sardinian lead has a new, formidable argument to support it: Natalino Mele's DNA test."

Black Florence

Mario Rosati's story begins with his parents' move to Tuscany: "My father commanded the Tempio Carabinieri Company, and after the successful investigations into the De André case and 40 other kidnappings, the so-called Gallurese anonymous group, he was promoted. He was assigned command of the Florence Operations Unit. I experienced that phase firsthand; we arrived in Tuscany in September 1985 and found a grim climate. As soon as I enrolled in Law School, I saw a city plastered with posters urging young people to be careful. A few days earlier, Jean-Michel Kraveichvili and Nadine Mauriot had been killed in the Scopeti area, a double homicide followed by the usual macabre ritual of mutilations. My father took over command of the unit investigating the "monster's" crimes; there was also a specialized group, led by Sardinian Marshal Salvatore Congiu. The investigators on Via Borgognissanti transferred the files to my father and in those pages he found the elements that led him back to Sardinia."

Investigations in Villacidro

This is the lead that leads to Salvatore Vinci, a craftsman from Villacidro who moved to Florence after his wife's death, the Sardinian lead. Mario Rosati lays out the facts: "My father reports several elements to the Florence Prosecutor's Office and to Magistrate Luigi Lombardini, with whom he works very closely: the anomalies surrounding the suicide of Vinci's wife, Barbarina Steri, in Villacidro in 1960; the theft of a .22-caliber pistol and about a hundred bullets (with the letter H on the base) also in Villacidro from Vinci's neighbor—weapons and ammunition that are a constant in all the "monster's" murders.

But, above all, it focuses attention on the murder of Barbara Locci and her lover Antonio Lo Bianco, on August 21, 1968, the crime that opens the series of murders of the couples. In the fall of 1985, Major Vincenzo Rosati believes, and writes, that the Locci-Lo Bianco double homicide is the key to everything. Mario Rosati explains: "And so we arrive at the very recent DNA test. My father places Salvatore Vinci among the subjects present at the crime scene and connects Natalino Mele, Barbara Locci's son, to the Vinci family. The six-year-old boy was sleeping in the back seat of the car where his mother was murdered. Today we know that his DNA is compatible with that of Salvatore Vinci's family. My father reached this conclusion, through other means, thirty years ago. He spoke at length with Natalino, a grown man in 1985, gathering his confidences, about which I can say nothing. Vinci was arrested in 1986 and taken to Tempio prison, where he spoke with a cellmate, saying things relevant to the investigation. He was acquitted of murdering his wife and then disappeared into thin air. The Florence prosecutor's office never looked into him again. My father repeated it for years: Pacciani had nothing to do with it. For him, the "monster" was a different story, a simple one, like a Leonardo Sciascia novel.