Italian police investigate explosion of reporter’s car

A car belonging to one of Italy’s leading investigative journalists exploded outside his home, prompting an investigation by Italy’s anti-mafia authorities and a condemnation from Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni.

No one was injured in the incident.

The explosion late on Thursday, targeting Sigfrido Ranucci, the lead presenter of state-run RAI3’s Report investigative series, occurred on the eighth anniversary of the car bomb killing of Maltese investigative journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia.

The investigation program said the explosion was so powerful it could have killed anyone passing by.

Report said in a statement that Ranucci had just returned home at the time and her daughter had walked a half hour earlier.

The explosion destroyed the car, damaging another family car next to it, as well as the front door of Ranucci’s home in Pomezia, south of Rome.

Police, fire and forensic teams went to the scene and judges from Rome’s anti-Mafia police district investigated, Report said in a statement.

The video taken by Ranucci, who has been under police protection since 2021 due to threats arising from his grueling investigations, showed the shattered remains of cars and the door.

Commenting to journalists outside the RAI offices, Ranucci said the explosion was an “escalation” of two-year-old threats he believed were related to the Report’s investigations into links between Cosa Nostra, the ‘ndrangheta and far-right crime groups, and past major mob attacks.

Asked whether the explosion would have a chilling effect on Report’s work, he said his colleagues were used to working in difficult conditions.

“Anyone who thinks that by doing such a thing they can influence (influence) the work of the Report will achieve the exact opposite effect,” he said.

Meloni expressed solidarity with Ranucci and condemned what he called “the serious intimidation he has suffered.”

“Freedom and independence of information are fundamental values ​​of our democracies and we will continue to defend them,” he said in the statement.

Italian journalist unions, politicians and others also expressed their solidarity, while many noted that Ranucci had received other threats in the past, which led the Interior Ministry to provide him with a police escort.

The Report is one of the few investigative programs on Italian television and regularly broadcasts news featuring prominent Italian politicians, business leaders and public figures.

Ranucci has been sued multiple times for defamation and was acquitted in his latest case just this week.

“There were certainly a number of intimidation incidents that I always report,” Ranucci said.

“From an editorial perspective, there is definitely a general climate of isolation and delegitimization towards me and the entire editorial staff of the Report.”

The explosion occurred on the eighth anniversary of the murder on 16 October 2017 of Caruana Galizia, who wrote extensively about suspicions of corruption in Malta’s political and business circles.

Like Ranucci, he had faced dozens of libel lawsuits aimed at silencing his reporting.

Earlier this year, two men were convicted of complicity in murder and sentenced to life imprisonment.

In 2022, two more people pleaded guilty to the murder and were sentenced to 40 years in prison.

Italy ranks 49th out of 180 countries in terms of press freedom in Reporters Without Borders’ 2025 global index.