Italian prosecutors have reopened the investigation into the murder of filmmaker and poet Pier Paolo Pasolini, 51 years after he was killed. Radio Svoboda reported the development on Monday, November 2, citing the ANSA news agency.

Lawyer Stefano Maccioni submitted previously unknown archival film footage and other evidence for examination. He also said a new witness had emerged and urged people with information about the case to come forward.

Maccioni’s earlier requests to revive the inquiry were rejected in 2010, 2016 and 2023. A former member of the Magliana Gang claimed in 2023 that the crime may have been linked to the theft of original footage from “Salò, or the 120 Days of Sodom” and Pasolini’s attempt to retrieve it.

Pasolini was killed during the night of November 1-2, 1975, and his badly injured body was found on a beach in Ostia. Giuseppe Pelosi, who was 17 at the time, was convicted after confessing, but withdrew that account in 2005 and alleged that several men had carried out the attack. A subsequent investigation ended without results.