“They call them ‘suitable places'”: Interview with Natalie Sclippa
“They call them ‘suitable places'”: Interview with Natalie Sclippa, editor of lavialibera, on the investigation regarding the invisible detention places for migrant people.
With the investigation They call them ‘suitable places’, lavialibera sought to shed light on the reality of so-called “suitable places” (luoghi idonei), facilities used for the detention and repatriation of migrants in an irregular administrative situation. The goal of the investigation was to reconstruct a little-known system, explaining what these places are, how they function, and publicly mapping them, in response to the strong opacity that characterizes them. Through months of work, freedom-of-information requests, and direct testimonies, the investigation highlighted the critical issues of a system marked by scarce transparency, unclear rules, and inconsistent practices. It also raises significant questions about respect for fundamental rights, material detention conditions, and the effectiveness of oversight.
We interviewed the magazine’s editor and author of the investigation, Natalie Sclippa, to better understand these facilities, the work carried out, and the overall picture that emerged from the investigation. Her words reveal the critical issues surrounding these places, the difficulties in obtaining official data, the institutional resistance encountered, and the effort to reconstruct a map that until now did not exist. Below is what emerged from the interview.
How did you manage to reconstruct the map of “suitable places” in the absence of official public data, and what institutional resistance did you encounter during the investigation? Were the difficulties in accessing information isolated incidents, or do they reveal a structural problem of transparency in the system?
The investigation lasted several months. At the start, discussing it in the editorial office, we outlined the few fixed points we had on this issue: the text of the 2018 Security Decree, which first referred to “suitable places”, and the few articles that over the years had touched on the issue. In any case, these were episodes and complaints at the local level, particularly from the Association for Legal Studies on Immigration (ASGI). Lavialibera‘s goal was therefore to create a map, to find out how many of these places there were, how they were managed, what rules they followed, and how many people had passed through them. We shouldn’t forget that these are rooms where foreign nationals are detained and repatriated within a few days. And the internal systems are so discretionary that at times people struggle to even contact a lawyer.
Building this map required a great deal of data and information, which at the time was held only by the police headquarters (questure). So we used a tool called “generalized civic access” (accesso civico generalizzato), an instrument for requesting figures and documents held by public administrations for free. I sent 108 requests, one for each police headquarters. After 30 days – the time public offices have by law to respond – only some had confirmed or denied the presence of these rooms at their premises. Following an appeal, more responses came in.
Some of the information I had requested – such as the size of the rooms, the presence of windows, tables, chairs, and beds – is now “secret,” after then-Interior Minister Lamorgese signed a decree in 2022 removing this information from what is disclosable to citizens. Much of this data now falls under the broad umbrella of national security matters and therefore cannot be shared. There is a lack of transparency around suitable places, and on top of this opacity there are also delays: it has been more than 1,000 days – almost 3 years – since the National Guarantor for the Rights of Persons Detained or Deprived of Personal Liberty last published its report, which is supposed to come out annually.
Without data and monitoring, an investigation like the one carried out by lavialibera is a first step toward knowing about and sharing information about the dark spot of so-called “administrative detention”.
If these places remain effectively unknown to public opinion, can we speak of a “functional invisibility”? Who actually benefits from this opacity, and how does it affect the possibility of democratic oversight?
I don’t know who benefits from it, but based on what we gathered, we can outline the profile of those who are harmed instead. They are usually foreign citizens who go to the police headquarters to renew their documents. If there are bureaucratic problems, people are detained in these rooms for a period ranging from 24 hours to 4-6 days. The detention is validated by a justice of the peace, who, as far as we know, can confirm the measure remotely, without seeing the actual conditions of the suitable places or the health status of those held there. At some police headquarters, phones are taken away upon entry; in other cities, such as Milan, in the holding cells used as suitable places, sheets and blankets are not changed between one detention and the next. These are situations we wanted to shed light on, in an effort to expose this fast-track expulsion system that very few people know about.
How do “suitable places” fit in relation to CPRs (repatriation detention centers): are they an emergency tool, or an extension of them that is less regulated and less monitored? And if, formally, they are supposed to guarantee the same rights (health, defense, communication, and dignified conditions), what mechanisms ensure this is respected in the absence of uniform controls and protocols, and what protections remain in case of violations?
Suitable places first appeared in 2018, when then-Interior Minister Matteo Salvini signed the Security Decree amending the 1998 Consolidated Immigration Act. Specifically, Article 4 of the law referred for the first time to “different and suitable facilities available to the public security authority,” to be used “in cases where there is no availability of places” in the repatriation detention centers (CPRs). When the government changed, the ministry led by Luciana Lamorgese (during the Conte II and Draghi governments) incorporated some of the Guarantor’s recommendations and set clearer rules, though without ever publishing a map. It had nonetheless been established that these facilities were “a substitute for CPRs” and that the same rights should therefore apply within them: protection of health, safekeeping of personal belongings, meal service, meetings with lawyers and social-psychological support staff, written or telephone correspondence, and the keeping of logs of admissions and critical incidents. Initially, cities with a CPR were not supposed to have suitable places; instead, we know that both exist in Rome and in Milan. On paper, the rights that must be respected in CPRs and in suitable places are equivalent, but at least two major gray areas remain to be clarified: health and access to the premises.
How can this form of deprivation of liberty for administrative violations be reconciled with the principles of the rule of law and the obligation of clear, foreseeable, and verifiable limits? Within this framework, what concrete guarantees remain for detained persons?
This is one of the open questions regarding the use of suitable places. After the publication of the first investigation, we are now gathering further information for additional in-depth reports, to understand to what extent these procedures are violating the principles of the rule of law and the obligation of clear, foreseeable, and verifiable limits.
Given the lack of public regulations and the inconsistency of practices among police headquarters, what minimum standards are actually guaranteed? How are the differences justified (for example, regarding phone access, material conditions, legal assistance), and what tools exist to prevent arbitrary decisions or abuse in such a discretionary system?
These questions also remain unclear. Associations have taken action on this issue. On June 6, 2025, following a request submitted by ASGI, the president of the Immigration Section at the Naples justice of the peace’s office stated that he had never carried out inspections or inspection visits at facilities used as suitable places, that he did not have any inspection reports relating to such visits, and that he considered this task outside his own responsibilities, attributing it instead to the General Prevention and Assistance Office. A similar response came a few days later from the Prevention Office of the Naples 1 Centro Local Health Authority (ASL): “for detention in suitable facilities, no intervention by the ASL is envisaged unless specifically requested by the police headquarters. Finally, there is the issue of access by third parties: not being allowed in means being unable to monitor conditions and unable to prevent abuse”.
What are the actual conditions inside these spaces in terms of hygiene, access to legal defense, communication, and healthcare – and how much do these differ from the formally established standards? And what effects does this form of detention – brief but sudden – have on the people involved, including psychologically and in terms of their sense of dignity?
We are working on the psychological effects of detention and repatriation, because it’s an aspect that seems to be completely overlooked, yet it has a strong impact on people’s lives. I met a citizen of Ghana who had the courage to tell me how he experienced those days. In the article we call him Isaac, to protect his identity. He arrived in Sicily in 2016, and his life changed suddenly in 2023. He had been living for years in Naples, working for a construction company; then his contract expired, and so did his documents. He called his lawyer, who booked him an appointment at the police headquarters. Once there, officers explained there were problems with his papers. One of them told him he would not be going home again and would be sent to Africa. Worried, he called his lawyer again, who tried speaking with the police, but nothing could be done. Shortly afterward, police officers took him into a room that looked like a cell; he was then transferred to Rome, escorted on the journey to the airport, and put on a flight to Ghana with a layover in Casablanca. He told lavialibera that he returned home with no money, no explanations, nothing – it was a great suffering, and he didn’t know what to do, since both his parents had died. Only thanks to his lawyer’s intervention was he able to return to Italy.
Do the numbers collected (over 2,500 people and more than 60 facilities) suggest a marginal or a structural phenomenon? And how plausible is it that this data is underestimated due to the lack of transparency?
We know the phenomenon is growing. Over the last three years, the number of people detained has multiplied: 309 in 2023, 906 in 2024, and 1,225 in the first ten months of 2025. The absence of public mapping makes monitoring very difficult and leaves it up to citizens to make up for this lack of transparency. The numbers are most likely an undercount, since we did not obtain information on Ancona, Ascoli Piceno, Bari, Belluno, Caltanissetta, Caserta, Grosseto, Messina, Piacenza, Rovigo, Salerno, Turin, and Trieste. But we will soon be able to add this piece to the story too, because the investigation is ongoing.
