Featured Image Credit: Pomeriggio 5
Topics: Crime, World News, News
Callum Jones
A man admitted to strangling his own mother to death on live television in a shocking interview broadcast on Italian TV.
Lorenzo Carbone, 50, appeared very emotional as he confessed to ending the life of his 80-year-old mom, Loretta Levrini.
Italian show Pomeriggio Cinque came across the man outside his Spezzano di Fiorano home on the off chance while reporting on Loretta's death.
Loretta was found dead in her bed by her daughter last Sunday, with police beginning a search for Carbone, who had lived with his mother.
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Carbone explained in the TV interview how he fled to the nearby town of Pavullo after killing his mother, before returning home.
Carbone told journalist Fabio Giuffrida that his mother had been living with dementia, saying: "I couldn't stand it any longer, I couldn't manage her. I strangled her, I don’t know why I did it.
"Every now and then she made me angry as she kept repeating herself."
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The Italian explained how he used a shoelace to kill his mother, leaving the reporter in utter shock as to what he had just heard.
Speaking of the incident, reporter Giuffrida - who immediately called the police who arrested Carbone - said: "Never would I have thought I would find myself in front of an alleged killer.
"At one point I noticed a man who was nearing the entrance, he was sweating, he was in a state of confusion."
However, the incident has also sparked a huge row in the region over media ethics, with the show's host, Myrta Merlino, coming under fire for running the clip.
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But speaking to Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera following the controversy, Merlino said she had 'reasoned as a journalist'.
She said: "I received a call from the correspondent a few minutes before going live.
"I had little time to decide. I only care about one thing: that it doesn’t damage the investigation. The man was wanted. The police were called and authorised me to broadcast the images of the interview."
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Gaia Tortora, the deputy director of Italy’s TV channel TG La7, took to Twitter to question Pomeriggio Cinque and broadcaster Mediaset for broadcasting the interview.
"What happened today on Pomeriggio5 is very serious," the post read. "This is not our job. Tearing up the code of ethics, we are hitting rock bottom."
Loretta is due for a post mortem examination in the coming days.