Police officers in the Italian city of Turin arrested a 25-year-old Moroccan national on Sunday after he brandished a knife at locals while being completely naked at the time.
The incident took place at the Piazza Vittorio Veneto in the centre of the northern Italian city on Sunday evening after the 25-year-old had entered a local Brazilian restaurant where he stole a large kitchen knife.
After the theft, the owner of the restaurant attempted to pursue the migrant while also alerting police and describing the 25-year-old to officers.
The officers approached the Moroccan at the Piazza Vittorio Veneto and made efforts to talk him into putting the knife down but rather than complying, the migrant attempted to attack them along with attacking some nearby cars, Il Giornale reports.
Police eventually managed to surround the naked migrant and disarm him, taking him into custody as a mob of locals were becoming increasingly agitated, according to police. He is accused of public indecency, theft, and attempted injury. The local police force said that he has a prior criminal record and is well-known to them.
The incident is just the latest this year to see a migrant armed with a knife either threaten or attack locals in an Italian city.
In June, a 44-year-old man from the African country of Ghana was shot in the legs by police after he threatened locals with a knife near Rome’s Termini railway station. The officer who shot the migrant was later placed under investigation, a move criticised by a local police union official as well as League leader Senator Matteo Salvini.
Just a few months later, a 26-year-old from Somalia pulled out a knife in the city of Rimini after being asked for a ticket while aboard a local bus in September. He stabbed four women and slashed a six-year-old child across the throat before he was finally detained by police.