Rome— A man in Rome confessed to authorities Monday to killing his sister, whose hacked-off legs were accidentally found in a city trash bin while her head and remaining body parts were later discovered in a garbage container on another street, police said.
Maurizio Diotallevi, 62, was questioned at police headquarters by an investigating magistrate, a statement from police headquarters said.
"In front of the magistrate, Diotallevi admitted being the one who committed the murder and who attempted to hide the body," the statement said.
The victim was identified as Nicoletta Diotallevi, 59, who lived with her brother in an apartment in the Flaminio neighborhood. Police found the brother in that apartment.
It was in another upscale neighborhood, Parioli, about a kilometer (half-mile) away, that a young woman on Tuesday night, rummaging through a trash bin used by residents on the street discovered two legs, wrapped together with package tape, police said.
Italian police officers and forensic experts inspect a trash bin in which were found parts of human body in Rome, Wednesday, Aug. 16, 2017. (Angelo Carconi/ANSA via AP)
The woman, who immediately alerted police, was reported to be in shock after the grisly find, Italian media said.
Police didn't say how the woman was killed.
Police questioned the brother after viewing images from a surveillance camera near the trash bin. In the video, "in the night between Monday and Tuesday, a man was seen heaving a heavy object into the bin," the police statement said.
Italian police officers stand near the site where a trash bin was removed after two amputated legs were found in Rome, Wednesday, Aug. 16, 2017. (Angelo Carconi/ANSA via AP)
Also helping investigators was a missing persons' report filed Monday on Nicoletta Diotallevi. The Italian news agency ANSA said that the brother himself had filed the report.
Not far from the siblings' apartment, police found the other body parts, wrapped in a bag and inserted in a trash bin.
The suspect was jailed. A judge must rule in a few days whether to uphold the detention order.
Exactly what triggered the slaying wasn't immediately known, but police said "the crime apparently happened for family reasons."