The marble tomb of the Italian Renaissance painter Fra Angelico was vandalized in the church of S. Maria sopra Minerva in the center of Rome, one of the most famous churches of the Italian capital. Vandals chipped off several parts of the marble tomb, carved by the fifteenth-century sculptor Isaia da Pisa.
Fra Angelico (1395-1455) is best known in Italy as Beato Angelico, after Pope John Paul II beatified in 1982 in recognition of the sanctity of his life.
The marble life-sized effigy of Fra Angelico with his head resting on a cushion and his hands crossed, was hit several times and in several places, leaving scars on the marble.
Arianna Cajano, the official of the Rome department responsible for planning the restoration project, called it "a very serious disfigurement that denotes a total lack of respect for the place and the object itself."
Sources: Il Messaggero, Roma Repubblica and Wanted in Rome