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A trio of officers were killed and no fewer than 15 people got wounded in what appears to be intentional detonation from gas at a country home in northern Italy.

Sequence of Events

The explosion occurred as police and firefighters approached the house near the city of Verona to execute an court-ordered eviction for a brother and sister trio aged in their 50s and 60s.

All three victims who died served in the Carabinieri force.

Legal Proceedings

A man and a woman got detained at the scene and a third person who escaped subsequent to the incident was located shortly later. Each of them have been transported to hospital.

The explosion could be noticed some 5km (3 miles) away and images from the location showed the structure left as a pile of rubble.

“This moment calls for sorrow,” said the Interior Minister the Interior Minister, who noted that previous tries had been made to evict the three family members in the previous occasions.

Property Situation

The head of the Veneto area, Luca Zaia, explained the farmhouse was facing an eviction order due to debts accumulated by the property owners.

Conflict resolution experts had been dispatched to speak to the siblings who had locked themselves into the house. When the Carabinieri came just after 03:00 (01:00 GMT), investigators think a family member set off the blast.

“When we entered the property, we faced an utterly insane act,” local police chief the police commander told reporters.

“A gas cylinder had been set off, and the blast directly hit our personnel,” he said.

Incendiary devices were also discovered at the site, the Interior Minister stated.

Casualties and Damage

Those injured by the incident consisted of an additional 11 personnel of the military police as well as three officers of national police and a fire services member.

As stated by the local prosecutor, the building was in a dilapidated shape and had lacked electrical service.

The prosecutor believed the blast had occurred on a story above the entrance and informed journalists it was a “deliberate and pre-planned murder”. Moments before the incident, he mentioned members had “noticed a hissing sound, probably the gas canisters being turned on”.

Local Response

“We all knew the situation was dire,” local residents told reporters, noting that the family members had in the past stated to “detonate the property” rather than be evicted.

“The explosion had left a ‘terrible, very painful and dramatic toll’.”

Defence Minister Guido Crosetto stood alongside other political leaders in paying tribute to the three officers who had lost their lives in the service of their country.