PAESE SERA/LOCAL NEWS - ROME
Sunday, Monday 3 1981«The devil is in you»
He comes home and kill his fatherby EMILIO RADICE
On July 25, 1997, a terrible thing happened in the town of Terni: a seventeen-years-old boy that day shooted his father during a mental crisis.
Reports of that time said that the boy thought that his father was oppressive.
These days they told us to come back to Terni to discover that the name of Meneghetti and his ontopsychology isn't unknown to that unfortunate boy. We are in Via Gabelletta, a street halfaway between Terni and Sangemini, but Spiridioni family doesn't live here no more, but neibours still remember that terrible summer day. "The day after Mauro shooted his father, his mother and his brother went to live over there" addressing us to a crumbling build-up area. We go there and finally we meet a blond boy, we ask him where the Spiridioni family lives and he says that he is Massimo Spiridioni and he lives there at the ground floor.
It's not easy to talk about an item like a parricide, this family must be totally devastated. Mrs. Spiridioni seems to be not so confused and continues to stir the pottage but soon she starts to cry: "Poor Ferruccio, he looks like he was only thirty years old... what a terrible end of him... and my poor son that now stay in a terrible mental home in Anversa and still doesn't know that he has killed his father, he isin't aware of it!". We ask Mrs. Spiridioni if she remembers a psychologist called Meneghetti and she says: "Yes, of course.
One day he arrived and told me that he would have cured my Mauro. He had a lot of academic titles with him, physician, professor, psychologist, he was very impressive". We ask her if she had called Meneghetti and she says : "they told me that he was a good doctor... but... "the woman starts to cry again" he told me that my son had a lot of problems and he should have left and stayed with him for 15 days to cure his mental troubles.
Meneghetti told Mauro to go to Rome immediatly. Mauro decided to go, he was scared of the negative prophecies of that man, and followed him. My husband wanted to go with them, but Meneghetti didn't wanted, and now I know the reason why..." the woman is silent.
Massimo Spiridioni, the brother of the poor Mauro, listen with his sad eyes, the tragedy is still alive in their hearts. Mrs Spiridioni continues her story: "Mauro told me what the psychologists did, he was strange but not crazy yet, they said that it was only a crisis of the adolescence, actually Mauro had almost finished the school... but one day my son called me and said that he was escaped from the Meneghetti's centre and he needed us.
We called the Professor and he told us that it was alright and Mauro was safe with him. At midnight my son called again and said 'What are you doing? I'm waiting for you on the Termini Railway Station in Rome.. please come!". So my husband went there, Mr. Meneghetti told us a lie. When I finally had Mauro in my arms, he related me a strange story".
That's what Mauro said to his mother: "Mum, when I was alone with Meneghetti he told me that I was the devil, the evil was in me. I said that it wasn't true but he insisted... he said that Satan was in me. When we arrived in his centre in Rome, they leaded me in a room full of windows and a strange music; later a group of people entered and Meneghetti asked them 'who's right? Mauro or me?' and people screamed 'Antonio! Antonio!' (Meneghetti, n.d.r.) and everybody clapped their hands. Then they pulled down a strange picture from the floor, it was a demon and they told that it was like me! That's the reason why I'm escaped from that place!"
Mrs Spiridioni's story is amazing, it seems the tale of a crazy boy, but something is interesting for us, some details: "From the moment Mauro met Meneghetti his mind started to get worse, the boy always said that that man possessed him. Mauro also wrote on his diary that Meneghetti had ruined him because he was the personification of the Devil.
My boy told me 'Mum, that man changed me, I'm becoming another person!'. After those two consultations, Meneghetti asked us 80,000 lire (but the real 15 days therapy costed 800,000), Mauro was even more strange. My son told us that me and my husband were the demons of his life. I thought that it was necessary to hospitalize him, but physicians said that it wasn't... so that day arrived and my poor husband died!".
The woman is still crying, it's better to leave her alone, so Massimo Spiridioni lead us to the door. He was very young when his brother went crazy, but he remember every detail: "They say that Meneghetti wasn't a real physician, that he did wrong to a lot of people in Terni, that he was a criminal.
He was a former priest that get married... why does that bad man get in our lives?". Massimo was right, Meneghetti was the priest of Santa Maria Regina, a parish in Terni and was inquired for tax evasion, and other crimes that aren't still confirmed. Judge Cappelli tried to inquire a lot about him, he investigated on the illegal medical activity of some psychologists, but Meneghetti always exculpated himself sayng that he managed spiritual courses and not therapies.
All the evidences were against him.
Who's right?
