The condition of a man attacked in the centre of Verona last week by a group of youths with links to the far right has worsened, doctors said Monday.
Nicola Tommasoli, a 29-year-old industrial designer, has been in a coma since the evening of May 1 when he was attacked by five skinheads, allegedly because he had refused to give them a cigarette.
Doctors on Monday began a period of observation required before declaring a patient brain dead.
Three of Tommasoli's attackers are currently in custody.
High school student Raffaele Delle Donne, 19, gave himself up to Verona police on Sunday, while metalworker Guglielmo Corsi, 19 and financial promoter Andrea Vesentini, 20, were arrested in the early hours of Monday morning.
Police appealed again to two other men - thought to have fled abroad - to give themselves up.
Three of the five men are already known to the police because of connections to a group of extreme right sympathizers in the city, the Veneto Skinhead Front, many of whom are also hard-core 'ultra' fans of the Verona football team.
But both police and politicians in the northern city have been quick to play down a far-right motive for the crime.
Public prosecutor Francesco Rombaldoni said the attack on Tommasoli was ''not political'' and the story that it was motivated by a cigarette was ''plausible''.
Verona mayor Flavio Tosi on Monday said: ''Verona is not a city of neofascists, and it does not deserve this shameful label because of the actions of a few hooligans''.
The Verona Student Union hit back at Tosi's remarks, accusing him of belittling the situation and pointing to a ''worrying comeback'' of politically motivated violence.
''We can't accept the fact that we have to feel fear while we walk the streets of our city because of people our own age who commit acts of violence in the name of ideological fanaticism,'' the union said.
''We are tired of being threatened and physically attacked by people who sympathise with extreme right factions''.
