Italian prisons under fire as video footage shows guards beating inmates

Italy's justice minister orders an investigation after images from the 2020 incident are published

Italy's justice minister, Marta Cartabia, has ordered a report into conditions in the country's prisons after the release of video footage showing guards brutally beating inmates at a jail near Naples who had demanded better coronavirus protections.

The shocking scenes of prisoners being kicked, slapped and beaten with truncheons at Santa Maria Capua Vetere prison in Caserta were caught by surveillance cameras on 6 April 2020, the day after a riot erupted in the prison as inmates demanded face masks and Covid-19 tests in reaction to an outbreak of the virus. The footage was published this week by the newspaper Domani.