Rome, bathes naked in the fountain of the Naiads: stopped by police, video goes viral

An unseasonably cool swim, completely naked, in the Fountain of the Naiads, the work created between 1885 and 1914 and located in front of the exedra in Piazza della Repubblica, in one of Rome’s busiest areas, just a short walk from Termini station. Indulging in the cold plunge was an evidently altered man, wearing a flashy red hat on his head, this morning around 9:30.

It took five State Police officers, assisted by local police, to stop him: the whole sequence, which went around the web, was filmed by passers-by. At first the man, a 30-year-old Nigerian man, can be seen reaching the top of the fountain’s bronze group and beginning to mock and threaten the officers, who at first try to get him out of the Naiads fountain nicely. After that, some policemen jumped into the fountain and the man doused them with splashes of water, sort of like playing at the beach. In the end, the young man was literally tackled by a policeman who jumped in, pouncing on him after other colleagues tried to stop him with batons (from the video it would appear that a couple of blows go in): five men eventually pinned him down and handcuffed him to take him to the police station.

The man is currently in the hospital for investigation, and is charged with resisting a public official, violence and injury. According to the Corriere di Roma, the 30-year-old man holds a regular residence permit (however, it is not known whether he has a record, nor is it known why he bathed in the fountain), while according to Il Tempo before the fountain plunge the 30-year-old man allegedly harassed passersby in front of Termini station. The Corriere also says that with regard to the officers’ actions, police are assessing whether the procedures that are followed in cases such as these were followed. The fountain, on the other hand, appears to have suffered no damage.

Rome, bathes naked in the fountain of the Naiads: stopped by police, video goes viral

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