Hated and Proud- Ultras Contra Modernity

by Mark Dyal

  In the 2 pm hour Atalanta BC Ultras outside their Curva Sud attacked the police with rocks and sticks. The police responded with teargas. Nearby the Milan Ultras engaged the police but most were already in the stadium. When they realized the Atalanta Ultras were fighting the police elsewhere they tried to exit the stadium but were charged by the police and constrained to stay inside.

  As game time approached the situation calmed, but the Ultras had already decided that under no circumstances was the game to proceed. As the game started they used a manhole cover to blast a hole in the partition separating the field from the Curva as an attempt to get the game stopped. The most popular video of the day is of them smashing a hole in the glass barrier, while Christiano Doni and other Atalanta BC players pleaded with them to stay calm. During the interruption, the AC Milan Ultras exited the stadium and were escorted back to the Bergamo central station. At the announcement of the game’s abandonment, the Atalanta BC Ultras gave a victory yell. After exiting the stadium, there were no serious incidents. The Atalanta BC and AC Milan Ultras, as much as it pained Claudio of Ultras Romani to say of their bitter rivals, ‘had done their duty.’

  In Other Cities

  There was Ultra activity in other Italian stadiums, as many acted with fury that the games had been allowed to go ahead as scheduled. In Florence, a small number of AC Fiorentina Ultras sang songs against the police but were drowned out by the whistles and singing of the ‘other Ultras’ (according to Mediaset’s TG1 newscast). Lorenzo Contucci wrote on the website of AS Roma Ultras that this news was actually saying that there are only 200 or so people in Florence worthy to call themselves Ultras.

  Songs against the police were sung in Reggio Calabria and Siena. In Reggio, there were no colors. In Turin, the Torino Ultras left the curva in protest, followed in kind by the Catania Ultras. Initially the Torino Ultras decided against displaying colors in the curva. It was only after the game started that they decided to leave the stadium. They were joined outside by the Catanesi (people of Catania), where they too sang against the police.

  In Parma, where Juventus was playing, there appeared a banner reading ‘La morte è uguale per tutti’ (All deaths are equal). As the game began, the Juventus Ultras had all their banners turned upside-down (a common sign of protest among Ultras). Then, in accord with the Parma Ultras, both groups followed the game in silence (except to sing against the police).

  The Ultras’ reaction was seen also in smaller cities. In Serie C, Taranto Ultras pelted the field and forces of law and order stationed under their curva with stones and other objects, thus bringing their game to a halt. The police responded with tear gas. In Potenza, six Brindisi fans were arrested for violence against a public official. In the Lazio Lega Eccellenza (amateur league) game between Boville and Latina, three Carabiniere officers were injured by a bomb thrown from the Latina curva. Otherwise the league’s games were played without incident.

  After Raciti was killed in February 2007, I heard no Ultras say they were glad that a police officer had been killed. No one mentioned his death at all, except to acknowledge its role in the government’s subsequent crackdown on the Ultras. After Sandri was killed, however, the smoldering tension created by the months of what they saw as repression exploded into a spontaneous nationwide uprising. Although not in all cities were the Ultras’ actions violent, but there was still a collective will toward expressing grief and frustration. As a violent, militant, and militarist brotherhood, the Ultras’ dedication to a radical anti-bourgeois worldview put them at odds with the police. Rather than uniting as oppressed victims of injustice, the Ultras exploded in rage because that was the logical way to express their anger and to honor the sacrifice of Gabriele Sandri. Likewise, there was no similar night of violence following Raciti’s death. Instead, it was only after Sandri that cries of ‘1,000 Raciti’s’ could be heard amongst AS Roma’s Ultras.

  Figure 9. Ultras graffiti calling for the deaths of 10, 100, 1000 Raciti (police officer Filippo Raciti), Rome, 2007.

  The Italian Football Association President Giancarlo Abete seemed completely dismayed at the violence in Bergamo, insisting repeatedly that what was happening had neither a connection with soccer nor the relationship between the police and some Ultras. He then said that it was not parallel with Catania, which, in his mind, involved a premeditated attack on the police. This death was just accidental, he repeated.

  Rome

  By late afternoon, news began circulating of huge protest marches in Milan and Rome. In Rome, AS Roma and Cagliari Calcio were scheduled to play at 8:30 pm. Ultras from SS Lazio and AS Roma were discussing ways to ensure that the game would be stopped. Word reached the media around 5 pm that the two curvas, Curva Sud Roma and Curva Nord Lazio, were uniting in order to force the game’s postponement.

  Around 6 pm the game was officially postponed. In the minds of the Ultras, though, it was not abandoned out of respect for Sandri and his family, but out of fear of public disorder. Meanwhile, at 6:15 pm, Luigi Conti, the lawyer for Sandri’s family, announced on RAI’s TG1 newscast, along with Gabriele’s brother Christiano, that the shooting could not have been accidental based on eyewitness accounts. He called it a murder and said that, based on early evidence, the shooting must have occurred ‘like target practice.’ Sandri, he vividly explained, was shot while seated in the backseat of a car that was leaving the Autogrill. At this time, there were already SS Lazio fans arriving in Arezzo, shouting ‘Assassini’ outside the police station.

  A Guerilla War in Rome

  As the sun fell on Rome, Skynews 24 was reporting that away games would be banned, possibly forever, as the Ultras were ‘holding the season hostage.’ Accompanied by live scenes near the Olympic Stadium of Ultras throwing unidentifiable objects at police-lines and passing cars, Giancarlo Abete now said that the violence was proof of ‘structural hatred’ of the police amongst the Ultras. The death of Sandri had sparked, he said, ‘a guerilla war in Rome.’

  By 8 pm all Ultra websites were shut down. The Ultras use their own sites for news. The largest of these is Tifonet, which collates news from various curvas. It reads like an hourly update on the Ultra experience. The most important website for Ultras happens to be associated with Curva Sud Roma. It is that of the now disbanded AS Roma Ultras. Its Webmaster, Lorenzo Contucci, is still involved in the Curva, however, as he is one of the most important lawyers and advocates for the Ultras and other political dissidents in Italy. The sites closed, asking for ‘giustizia per Gabriele’ (justice for Gabriele). I was later told by Federico of Antichi Valori that they closed because the Ultras believe that the government monitors the sites for information just as do the Ultras.

  The main body of Lazio Ultras marched to Piazza Euclide, but by 6 pm had already attacked one police station near the Olympic Stadium. According to Il Messaggero, the general battle was between Ultras with flares and bombs and police with teargas. As they marched, the face-covered Ultras torched scooters and trash bins, as well as a police bus and several cars.

  Elsewhere, twenty Ultras attacked police on Via Bosis, near the stadium, with bottles, bolts, and pieces of iron. One person from this attack was arrested. Then, the Ultras assaulted the headquarters of the Italian Olympic Committee (CONI), which is located next to the stadium in one of the buildings comprising the Foro Italico. Over one hundred Ultras broke into the lobby of the building. The unarmed security guards locked themselves in the offices while the Ultras destroyed the lobby. According to Skynews 24, after one group had entered the building, another group waited outside, seeking to draw in the police. They refused the chase and the Ultras instead entered the building.

  They ignited a bomb that damaged the marble, destroyed the China Olympics countdown clock, all the windows, and a computer at the reception desk. After CONI, a group of Ultras entered the stadium (but did no damage). At this point the Ponte Duca d’Aosta (which spans the Tiber at the Mussolini obelisk that marks the entrance to the stadium) was barricaded with crowd control barrie
rs and garbage bins. Many Ultras could be seen armed with iron bars and with their faces covered. They set about burning the trash bins at the mouth of the bridge before crossing it and moving out of the area. Small groups formed and split from the main group of Ultras. Some of these smashed car windows and burned cars, scooters, and trash bins. The largest group assaulted police stations.

  The biggest attack on a police station occurred on Via Remi, near the Flaminio Stadium. Around two hundred Ultras amassed in front of the station. They set fire to a bus and a row of trash bins. They then broke the windows of the station and attempted to set it afire with flares and bombs. The tactic was repeated elsewhere. The police station at Ponte Milvio and another on Via Flaminia were attacked with flaming trash bins, stones, bottles, bolts, and other pieces of iron.

  Around midnight, the bulk of the action stopped when the police pulled everyone out of the area for fear of reprisals. According to Alessandro Marchetti (secretary of the Policeman’s Union) the pull-out left the city in the hands of the ‘teppisti’ (hooligans).82 While walking far enough from the stadium area to find a bus to the center of town I met a young Ultra who admitted to throwing stones at a police-line and a few passing cars near the stadium. He was an AS Roma fan but had joined a group of SS Lazio Ultras as they crossed the Duca d’Aosta Bridge. At that point, he was advised by one of the Ultras leading the group that he was better off not getting involved with them. He was only sixteen years old and did not share the ‘hardened’ appearance of most of the Ultras who were out that night. He stayed around the stadium to look for friends and, as he put it, ‘to see how [he] could help.’ As we walked he spoke of his disgust at the news coverage that had replaced soccer for the day. ‘The Ultras are always [presented as] animals,’ he said.

  The Media Responds

  When I arrived home, well after midnight, the twenty-four-hour RAI news channel was wrapping up the day’s events. They still called the shooting of Sandri accidental, but by now the shooting was a distant memory for the press. The real story was what happened in Bergamo and Rome. Various MP’s had their say. Maurizio Gasparri and Ignazio La Russa of Alleanza Nazionale attacked Amato for not stopping all the games — if not out of respect then out of concern for public safety. Forza Italia’s Fabrizio Cicchitto seconded their thoughts, saying that Amato had the power and responsibility to keep the violence of Bergamo and Rome from happening. Giovanna Melandri stated her support for Amato’s decision to cancel only Inter-Lazio and to start the others after ‘a moment of reflection.’

  Rome’s mayor Walter Veltroni received news of what was happening while in Cracow. He said it was a terrible day for all of Rome, but that the situation again showed that violence of any sort has no place in a civilized society. Veltroni then asked a group of two hundred students visiting a synagogue in Cracow to perform a moment of silence for Sandri. Piero Marrazzo, president of the Lazio Region, said that work must be done amongst children in order to create a culture of sport that refutes all forms of aggression.

  The next day, the press was universal in its condemnation of the Ultras. The major dailies sold in Rome (Il Messaggero, Il Tempo, La Repubblica, Corriere dello Sport, Corriere della Sera, La Gazzetta dello Sport, and Il Romanista) each carried a photo of either Rome or Bergamo. Two of them used ‘NO’ as a headline; two others used ‘BASTA’ (ENOUGH). As the night before, the reactions to Sandri’s death were more prominently covered than his death. In the morning, the name of the officer and details of the shooting were still undisclosed. By extension the jury was still out on Sandri’s culpability for what happened. The facts that were available seemed tame given the images of the previous evening: three arrests (of which one was a female), twenty policemen with minor injuries, and four policemen under medical supervision in a Rome hospital.

  Most of the news consisted of negative moralistic profiles of the Ultras. A typical article in La Gazzetta dello Sport identified the Ultras as ‘misguided thugs with a warped reality . . . who show up to games hoping for trouble.’ The author added that the Ultras are ‘dangerous rabble with power over the peace-loving masses that just want to enjoy soccer.’83 The Italian media used ‘teppisti’ and even ‘hooligan’ instead of ‘Ultras’ when talking about Rome, understanding well the moral implications of the switch in descriptive terms.

  At a café in my Monteverde neighborhood, the morning regulars all spoke of the previous day and night. The vast majority parroted the press in the assumption that the events of the morning and the evening were unrelated. This assumption could only be made with no understanding of the Ultras’ mentalità. The owner, who was aware of my involvement with the Ultras took me aside and explained to me in his best Italian (he usually spoke Roman dialect) that the Ultras were criminals who were killing the game. He suggested I come with him on Saturday mornings to watch his young son play if I wanted to see what was important in sports: sportsmanship, fun, innocence. The Ultras, he explained, with their ‘stupid rivalries and war against the police,’ had nothing to do with soccer.

  The midday TG1 newscast on RAI1 led with an update on the shooting and the subsequent violence. The State news agency ANSA identified the police officer who shot Sandri as thirty-five-year-old Luigi Spaccatorella of Arezzo. It was assumed that he would be facing charges of involuntary manslaughter. Through his lawyer, he issued a statement calling the shooting a terrible accident. According to the statement, a warning shot from two hundred meters was made, followed by an accidental firing as the gun came down. He said he was not aiming as he was running from two hundred meters.

  But on the 5 pm broadcast, the Police Chief of Arezzo, Vincenzo Giacobbe, stated that numerous witnesses saw Luigi firing with both hands, apparently in the belief that Sandri’s car had just robbed the petrol station at the rest area. The bullet (perhaps shot at the car’s tires) hit Sandri in the neck as he sat in the back driver-side seat. Back in Rome, the police injury list reached forty, with the most serious being an officer assaulted with an iron bar during one of the station raids.

  The Ultras Explain

  Talk amongst the Ultras was much like that amongst non-Ultras. Everyone wanted to know what had happened and why. There was a great disparity, however, in how the previous day was explained. Whereas the general public, politicians, and those involved in the business of soccer (including the media) spoke about Sandri’s death as a tragic accident unrelated to soccer and of the Ultras holding the game and its fans hostage for the sake of their anti-social war against the police, the Ultras spoke about honor, sacrifice, commitment, brotherhood, and, indeed, warfare.

  As I briefly explained above, the Ultras’ mentalità utilizes a model of history that deploys and creates heroes. Monday evening, a large group of Ultras met at the Cutty Sark Bar near Piazza Bologna. Many of them were at the stadium the previous evening. They were reluctant to talk about anything, and more importantly, anyone they had seen. This was a group of older Ultras — those who had seen the Curva become not only more ideologically influenced and violent, but also the prey of the police and various ‘governmental agendas.’

  The Ultras feel that they are used not only to justify the creation of a Police-State, but also the creation of myriad divisions and offices within the governmental bureaucracy that are charged with controlling soccer-related violence. The most vocal of those gathered allowed themselves the pleasure of being in the company of other Ultras. Unable to speak freely during their workday, they asked each other, among other things, ‘What do they want us to do?’ It was in situations like this that the hegemony of the State and media in control of the image of the Ultras was most telling.

  Despite the Ultras’ attempts to create public awareness (through banners, choreography, websites, offices, and even radio shows), they were still an isolated minority. And despite their self-representation as an elite phenomenon, in the aftermath of the Raciti death and the killing of Sandri, what the media and State say of them is far more powerful than what they say of themselves. Instead of
merely speaking past one another, however, the more the media described the Ultras as a violent mob which threatened the security of the State, the more the Ultras acted as a violent mob, albeit one incapable of threatening the State. For the Ultras present at the Cutty Sark, this was also apparent. ‘They speak, we act,’ said Fabio of Boys, ‘and this shows their cowardice and our courage.’

  The state of affairs also demonstrated that against the State, in the person of the police, the Ultras have an opponent that will at least confront them with arms, so to speak. It is never a fair fight when one battles with guns and teargas and the other with stones and bolts, but it is a battle nonetheless. Against the power of the media, dissident groups such as the Ultras find the rules of engagement far less equal, if no less consequential.84 Oddly enough, the Ultras are perfectly equipped to fight on both fronts. They will be violent, which suits the first, and they understand imagery, ideas, and how they interact in the production of information (even if many of them are verbally unaware of the connection) which suits the second. Although the Ultras made it clear that they understood what happened the day before, and what was happening to them as a phenomenon, they were still incapable of making anyone beyond other Ultras listen to their position. This is because of the distance between their values and those of their opponents.

  In the entirety of Italy, they said, there were only two groups who had acted honorably and nobly: the Atalantini (the Ultras of Atalanta BC, the team of Bergamo) and us (the AS Roma and SS Lazio Ultras). The Ultras in Bergamo had risked much to show their disapproval at the games being allowed to continue. They had acted not out of uncontrolled aggression but out of respect for Sandri, honoring his sacrifice with one of their own. It is rare to hear AS Roma Ultras speak positively of the Bergamaschi, as people from Bergamo are known, for the rivalry between the groups is deep, politically driven, and violent. Despite both sets of Ultras being of the Far Right, those of Atalanta BC are also aligned with the Northern League. As the League has gained notoriety, so too has its vehement denunciations of Rome as a cauldron of corruption and southern backwardness. When the two curvas meet, no punches are pulled. But these AS Roma Ultras were sympathetic to their Atalanta counterparts because they acted beyond themselves and stood up to the greed and might of Calcio Moderno.