Sorrento: Illegal storage for a restaurant in a Roman cistern: report filed and seizure ordered.

Sorrento – A restaurant's illegal storage facility in an ancient Roman cistern has been seized and the restaurant owner has been charged.

Checks by the Naples Metropolitan Police, Uses group, for occupation of public land, carried out on behalf of the Torre Annunziata Public Prosecutor's Office, led to the precautionary seizure of a building, known as the "Cunicolo Perimetrale delle Cisterne Basse," a state-owned building subject to cultural and archaeological restrictions, which had been used as a warehouse for two restaurants in Piazza Tasso.
The seizure was carried out following a thorough survey of illegal occupations of the Roman cisterns of Spasiano.

Following the inspection, the Metropolitan Police determined that the seized state-owned premises, located within the perimeter of the Roman cisterns of Spasiano, had been arbitrarily occupied. Its intended use had been changed without authorization to be used as a food storage facility for two restaurants belonging to the same company. Two specially constructed doors had been opened, allowing access to the premises from each of the two restaurants.
The premises are located in an area subject to archaeological and cultural restrictions, as they are part of the larger archaeological site of the Roman cisterns of Spasiano, an extraordinary hydraulic work from the Roman era. They had been further vandalized with the construction of a well equipped with an electric lifting pump.
Investigations are continuing to determine whether there have been any further unauthorized occupations of state-owned spaces of historical and cultural interest, which have been diverted over the years from their original purpose.