Two San Francisco rich kids on an Italian adventure shopped at Gucci, snorted some coke, then allegedly murdered an unarmed cop.
Finnegan Lee Elder, 19, and Gabriel Christian Natale-Hjorth, 18, are suspected of knifing newly married Vice Brigadier Mario Cerciello Rega, 35, 11 times on Friday.
According to Italian newspapers, Rega was the type of cop who spent his off-duty hours feeding Rome’s homeless.
On Tuesday, cops displayed an image of the suspected murder weapon — a 7-inch Ka-Bar knife with U.S. Marine Corps written on the side.
It was found hidden in the boys’ Rome hotel.
Emerging is a dark, troubled portrait of two spoiled California teens who classmates said thought they could get away with anything.
Carabinieri Gen. Francesco Gargaro told reporters that Rega and his partner, Andrea Varriale, were responding to a reported extortion attempt.
Cops say Elder and Natale-Hjorth were trying to get money and cocaine after they allegedly stole a dope dealer’s backpack.
“I’ve kind of always known that he’s a bad guy. He would come up in stories of just like activities that you wouldn’t want your kids getting into,” former classmate Tommy Flynn told the San Francisco Chronicle.
“He’s kind of been known around town as a delinquent character.”
Another added: “He’s known around here as a drug dealer. I feel like he thinks he can get away with everything. He’s gotten away with so much trouble in Marin.”
And Elder nearly killed a fellow high school student, leaving him with “severe brain damage” during an attack at a party in 2016.
Rega had just returned to duty after a romantic honeymoon in Madagascar when he was murdered.
The country’s Interior Minister and Deputy Leader Matteo Salvini weighed in and demanded life sentences for the accused jet-set killers.
“To those who complain about the arrest of a prisoner, remember that the only victim to cry for is a man, a son, a 35-year-old husband, a Carabiniere,” he said.
“A servant of the country died in service at the hands of people who, if guilty, deserve only life imprisonment.”
Cops say that already the two are getting their stories mixed up.
Elder told detectives he stabbed Rega because he was being strangled and feared for his life. There were no marks on his neck.
The slaying came just days after Natale-Hjorth spent hundreds of dollars at Gucci and took to Instagram to flaunt his wealth and new threads.
The pair are being held in solitary confinement at the Regina Coeli in central Rome.
Rega was eulogized Monday in the same church where he had been married six weeks earlier.
Copyright Postmedia Network Inc., 2019
