Teen Dies After Restaurant Meal With Basketball Team
Sofia Di Vico, 15, collapsed after a team dinner during a basketball tournament trip near Rome.
OSTIA, Italy — Italian prosecutors are investigating the death of a 15-year-old basketball player who fell gravely ill after a team dinner on a tournament trip April 2, as authorities work to determine whether milk exposure, food handling failures or problems in the emergency response led to her death.
Sofia Di Vico’s death has drawn national attention in Italy because it began as an ordinary youth sports trip and quickly became a criminal inquiry centered on allergy warnings, kitchen practices and the minutes between her first distress and her arrival at a hospital. Di Vico, from Maddaloni in the southern Campania region, was in Ostia with Unio Basket Maddaloni for the Mare di Roma Trophy in Pink when she became ill. Rome prosecutors opened a manslaughter case soon after her death, and investigators have been collecting medical, forensic and witness evidence while a grieving hometown waits for clearer answers.
According to the reconstruction reported so far by Italian media, Di Vico arrived on the Roman coast with her teammates for the tournament and was staying with the group at a campsite complex in Ostia. She had a known severe allergy to milk proteins, and her father, Fabio Di Vico, was on the trip with her. After dinner at a restaurant inside the complex on the night of April 2, her condition began to worsen rapidly at about 10:40 p.m. She was given emergency medication that had been brought for exactly that kind of crisis, but it did not stop the reaction. She was then taken by ambulance to Grassi Hospital in Ostia, where doctors were unable to save her. In remarks reported days later, her father said the risk linked to her allergy was serious and had been known before the meal was served.
Investigators have focused first on the restaurant and the food that reached the table. Police seized the kitchen and continued administrative and health checks while prosecutors began interviewing staff members and the manager of the venue. Early reporting said Di Vico had ordered a simple meal of scrambled eggs and green beans, but authorities have not publicly identified the precise point at which milk may have entered the food. That leaves several possibilities under review, including an ingredient that should not have been used, milk or cheese added during preparation, or cross contact from cookware, utensils or work surfaces. Officials also have not publicly released the exact form of any allergy warning given before dinner, including whether it was written down, passed verbally to staff, or correctly relayed from the front of house to the kitchen. Those details are likely to be central to the legal case because they speak directly to what people knew before the plate reached Di Vico.
The medical findings released so far have pointed investigators in one direction without fully closing the case. An autopsy performed at Rome’s Policlinico Tor Vergata produced an initial picture described by RaiNews as compatible with anaphylactic shock, but doctors said longer and more complex laboratory work would still be needed before a final medical conclusion could be issued. That means prosecutors have stronger support for the main theory of the case, but not a final answer. Investigators are also examining parts of the rescue sequence, including how quickly help arrived and whether every step worked as intended. Later Italian reports said the adrenaline auto-injector used during the emergency was seized for analysis after questions were raised about whether it functioned properly. The distinction matters because the final account may depend not only on what Di Vico ate, but on whether the response after she showed symptoms gave her a fair chance to survive.
The death also halted a youth sports event and sent shock through basketball circles in Campania. The Mare di Roma Trophy in Pink was suspended after Di Vico’s death, and FIP Campania, the regional basketball authority, said it was stopping weekend games while the community mourned. Giovanni Monda, the club’s technical director and one of the adults present on the trip, told RaiNews that Di Vico had been training with the club since she was 11 and called her “our champion.” He described a player who could be stubborn and gifted on the court, reserved with adults, and deeply loved by her teammates. That reaction underscored why the case spread far beyond the facts of one dinner in Ostia. Di Vico was not only a teenager on a school break or a traveler passing through Rome. She was part of a close local sports network, a student at the Cortese scientific high school in Maddaloni and, by multiple public accounts, one of the young faces of a tight-knit basketball community.
In Maddaloni, public grief quickly became part of the story. Mayor Andrea De Filippo said the loss was “an immense pain” for the city, and local authorities observed civic mourning when Di Vico was brought home for burial. Her funeral was held April 6 at the Church of the Annunziata, where hundreds of people, including classmates, teammates and relatives, gathered for the service. Reports from ANSA and RaiNews described young mourners filling the church from early morning, some wearing white shirts printed with “Ciao boss” and the number 30. After the white coffin was carried outside, several teammates dribbled basketballs on the church forecourt in a final goodbye before a long round of applause. The funeral scenes did not resolve the forensic questions, but they showed the emotional force behind the public demand for answers. In only a few days, a tournament trip had become a citywide mourning event marked by school friends, sports uniforms, family grief and a widespread sense that something ordinary had gone terribly wrong.
For prosecutors, the case now moves into a slower and more technical phase. As of April 12, no one had been publicly charged, and Italian authorities had not publicly named any defendant in the manslaughter inquiry. That is not unusual in an early investigation, especially one that still depends on lab findings, witness statements and the reconstruction of a medical emergency. The next steps are expected to include the final autopsy results, forensic analysis tied to the restaurant kitchen and food preparation process, and a closer review of communications about Di Vico’s allergy before dinner was served. Investigators may also weigh records from the campsite, emergency call timing, rescue logs and any technical findings on the auto-injector. Fabio Di Vico has said the family wants the truth and trusts the judicial process to establish responsibility. Whether the inquiry remains centered on food contamination alone or widens to include emergency failures will likely depend on the evidence still being processed.
As of Sunday, April 12, prosecutors were still reviewing kitchen evidence, medical testing and witness accounts in Di Vico’s death, and no public charges had been announced. The next major milestone is expected to be a fuller medical and forensic account explaining what likely triggered the reaction and what happened in the minutes before she reached the hospital.
Author note: Last updated April 12, 2026.