A blood-stained start to the new year in Gallura, the scene of an attempted murder along the Provincial Road 24 that leads from Padru to Buddusò and Alà.

The 83-year-old shepherd Giuseppe Fadda, who was on board a Renault Capture, was hit by several gunshots at the crossroads for Su Tirialzu not far from his home. The shooter fired from a few dozen meters away, from behind a dry stone wall that runs along the road.

The injured man's conditions are described as serious by the health workers: the man was transported to Sassari aboard the 118 helicopter rescue . The investigations were conducted by the Carabinieri of the operational section of the Olbia territorial department, together with their colleagues from the Radiomobile and the Padru station. The military are reconstructing the dynamics, whoever pulled the trigger wanted to kill.

They are digging backwards to understand what the motive could be, if there had been intimidation in the past or not and in the meantime the investigators have recovered a gun from the passenger compartment of the car. Fadda, better known by the name of ''Tiu Peppineddu'', in the summer sells typical products of the island such as salami, honey and pecorino in Puntaldia, near the Lu Impostu beach.

He became famous for his friendship with the American actor George Clooney, a lover of Sardinian cheeses – Fadda had sold him 60 kilos of pecorino – and who even wanted him in the role of an Army lieutenant in the TV miniseries ''Catch 22'' set during the Second World War and filmed a few years ago in the old airport of Vena Fiorita.

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