Matteo "Baro"'s broken dream: he was hit by a drunken off-duty policeman.

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Matteo Baro's Broken Dream, Killed by a Drunk Off-Duty Policeman

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Milan – A final photo, posted online a few hours before the crash, showed him smiling with singer Mahmood . His latest single, "Shawty," played in the background.

Matteo Barone, known to all as "Baro," was 25 years old and was chasing his dream: to make it big in the trap music world. A dream for which he'd given up everything, including his job, but which ended brutally yesterday at dawn, struck and killed by a car while crossing the street.

The alleged perpetrator, Giusto Chiacchio, a 26-year-old off-duty police officer, was arrested on suspicion of vehicular homicide. He tested positive for alcohol and attempted to flee the scene of the accident, only to be tracked down by local police.

The last vowel and the race home

It was 5:31 in the morning when Matteo, born in the province of Siena but Milanese by adoption, sent his last voice message to a friend: "I'm not recording because I'm drunk, but I'm much more than sober..." He was walking home after an evening with friends. He was less than 500 meters away and he would have been safe, in his apartment with his parents.

Instead, at the intersection of Via Porpora and Via Ingegnoli, his life came to an abrupt end. While crossing at the pedestrian crossing, he was struck by an Audi Q2 that, according to initial investigations, was speeding.

The impact was devastating: Matteo's body was dragged 38 meters. Immediately rescued by 118 and rushed to the hospital, he died an hour and a half later from his serious injuries.

The agent and the escape after the impact

Giusto Chiacchio, the driver of the Audi, is an officer at the Garibaldi police station in Venice. He, too, had just returned from an evening with friends. After the accident , in a state of shock, he left the Città Studi clinic, where he had been taken for tests. He was located several hours later and subjected to a breathalyzer test, which confirmed his positive results: 0,63 and 0,60 grams of ethanol per liter of blood, above the legal limit.

It wasn't the first time the officer had been involved in a similar situation: two years ago he had been found drunk, although not driving, and since then he had been subjected to six-monthly tests, which he had always passed.

His conduct, including failure to yield to pedestrians and speeding, led prosecutor Maurizio Ascione to order his immediate arrest. The officer is currently being held in Bollate prison.

“The year of his revolution”

For Matteo, music was more than a passion. It was a true mission. "He said it was the year of his revolution," a tearful friend recalls, hanging a photo of him and some bouquets of flowers at the scene of the accident. "He quit his job, sold everything he could to buy a PC, a microphone, and all the equipment he needed to produce music."

His dream was clear, and his songs bore witness to it. "I'll build an empire from scratch," he rapped in his debut single, "Via d'uscita." In another track, "Tank," he sang: "I'm taking flight, if you don't show respect, you'll trample on my dreams." Dreams that, unfortunately, never quite took flight.

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