Raffaele Manganiello

Raffaele Mangianello was an early convert to Fascism and took part in Mussolini’s March of Roma while a medical student. After graduating he began his climb in the ranks of the Fascist Party, becoming first an executive of the party at the local level, and then at the provincial and finally national level. For a brief few months in 1940, under the guidance of the Italian Governor of the Italian islands of the Aegean, Cesare Maria De Vecchi, he exercised the duty of administrator for the Dodecanese islands.

In November 1940 Manganiello took the office of President of the Italian Olympic Committee, which he maintained until 25 July 1943. With the fall of Mussolini, Manganiello was arrested and imprisoned until freed by German troops and returned with his leader to the occupied Repubblica Sociale Italiana.

On 1 October 1943, Manganiello was appointed by Mussolini as prefect of Firenze. He founded the Office of Jewish Affairs and began a reign of terror that was responsible for 100s of murders of Jews and political opponents in the city. In July 1944 Manganiello was appointed as Prefect of Torino but, on 14 September, travelling without an armed escort, he was taken prisoner by Communist partisans, executed, and his naked body was thrown into the Dora River.