Pietro De Negri, better known as Er Canaro (Roman dialect: "the dog keeper"; born 28 September 1956), is an Italian criminal, a dog coiffeur (hence the nickname) and a cocaine addict.
De Negri was born at Calasetta, in Sardinia. Later he lived in the Rome's neighbourhood of Magliana. At the age of 31, he killed former boxer, local tough guy, and fellow cocaine addict Giancarlo Ricci. The so-called "Crime of the Canaro" (Italian: Delitto del Canaro) is notable for being one of the most gruesome crimes carried out in Italy since the end of World War II, particularly because the victim watched powerlessly during the excessive mutilation.[1][2]
However, the post-mortem revealed that most of the torture described by De Negri had only been imagined by the man, who probably confused thought and reality as a result of his excessive consumption of cocaine. The boxer had been killed with a hammer, in no more than 40 minutes as opposed to the 7 hours of torture claimed by De Negri; no shampoo was used, nor had his cranium been opened. Some fingers have been amputated post mortem.