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Case #12

premeditated homicide

Case Description

Ser Bernardo Balbi, son of Ser Zuane, is accused having previously conceived a most grievous hatred against the late Noble Ser Zuan Francesco Bragadin, son of the late Ser Girolamo, and having made the deliberation to take his life—notwithstanding that he had given his word to a certain person not to offend him, and that he [Bragadin] could walk safely—he [Balbi] did, on the morning of the 20th of the present month, around the sixth hour, hide himself in the church of the Gesuati*; having with him two men dressed in foreign style as lookouts, who were posted outside the Church, awaiting and observing the arrival of the said Bragadin. As soon as he [Bragadin] arrived, one of the two lookouts gave the usual and known signal to Balbi, who exited the Church and, together with his men armed with diverse sorts of arms, assaulted him and wounded him in the head. Whereupon he [Bragadin], to save his life, threw himself into the water. And as he boarded the gondola that was prepared for this purpose, they fell upon the said Bragadin in the water with a hatchet**, striking him with many mortal wounds to the head and face with a cutting weapon, and one [wound] in the body with a sharpened weapon, and having jumped [into the water], he was slaughtered and died.

Date & Time

Date
May 20, 1615
Year
1615
Time
9h

Location

Address
Venice - (church)
City
Venice
Location Description
Church of Jesu Humilita

People Involved

Victim(s)

  • Girolamo Bragadin

Perpetrator(s)

  • Bernardo di Cesare Balbi
Relationship
enmity

Crime Details

Weapon
diverse weapons
Motive
mortal hatred
Fatality
Yes

Legal Information

Trial Phase
summons
Convicted
No
Pardoned
No
Sentence
banishment in contumacia
Sentence Enforced
No
Arbitration
No

Sources

Archival Location
ASV, X, Criminali, F 42