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Three members of law enforcement were killed and more than a dozen others got wounded in an apparently intentional gas explosion at a farmhouse in northern Italy.

Sequence of Events

The explosion took place as police and firefighters approached the property near Verona to enforce an removal notice for two brothers and a sister aged in their 50s and 60s.

Each of the three victims who died were members of the Carabinieri force.

Legal Proceedings

A man and a woman were taken into custody at the location and another man who fled subsequent to the incident was found shortly later. The trio have been transported to the hospital.

The explosion could be heard approximately 5 kilometers away and images from the location displayed the property left as a mass of wreckage.

“This moment calls for sorrow,” said Interior Minister the Interior Minister, who added that efforts had been made to remove the brother and sister trio in the previous occasions.

Financial Context

The president of the Veneto area, President Zaia, stated the residence was facing an eviction order due to financial obligations accumulated by the siblings.

Mediators had been sent to engage the family members who had barricaded themselves into the property. When the Carabinieri arrived shortly after 03:00 (01:00 GMT), officials think a family member set off the explosion.

“When we entered the property, we faced an utterly insane act,” provincial police commander Commander Papagno informed news outlets.

A gas canister had been ignited, and the explosion immediately struck our members,” he explained.

Incendiary devices were also discovered at the residence, the interior minister said.

Impact Assessment

Injured individuals by the explosion included an additional 11 personnel of the Carabinieri as well as three members of Italy's state police and a firefighter.

According to the prosecuting attorney, the farmhouse was in a poor condition and had lacked electrical service.

He thought the detonation had occurred on a level above the entrance and stated to reporters it was a “premeditated and voluntary homicide”. Moments before the blast, he mentioned members had “heard a whistle, probably the gas cylinders being turned on”.

Community Reaction

“All of us understood the scenario was critical,” neighbors told Italian media, adding that the trio had previously threatened to “blow themselves up” rather than be evicted.

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

The Defense Minister Guido Crosetto joined other political leaders in commemorating the three officers who had lost their lives in the line of duty.