“I miss my sea, running on the beach in Ostia with my father when I was a child. It’s just that when you have certain things at hand you don’t even notice them.” Kevin Di Napoli is 27 years old, he didn’t spend the last 6 years as a free man. Tonight at the Palastudio of Cinecittà World, in the BBT meeting which will have as its main event the interesting Ibf European light heavyweight championship between Squeo and Rasanen, he will enter the ring for the second time since returning to boxing. He is not a man seeking glory, he only wants redemption. “Staying out of prison is better than any title, I have been my own worst adversary,” is the phrase of Mike Tyson that he put on his profile.
The descent into hell
He was a promising boxer from Naples, even the Italian youth national team had noticed him. Then a descent into hell that began at 4 in the morning 6 years ago: “Blitz on my house. They entered the bedroom, they were wearing balaclavas, headlights pointed at me and repeated my name. I thought it was an ambush, paradoxically when I realized it was the police I relaxed.” A moment in which the doors of a promising career closed and those of prison opened: “I threw everything away. Clubs, alcohol, fights, I didn’t miss anything. Precisely for this reason I forcefully tell young people not to give in to the charm of the underworld. Commit yourself to school, work, music, whatever you want, but don’t follow false myths, the path is a bluff.”
In the San Pio community in Nola
Kevin is now serving his sentence in the San Pio community in Nola. “Everyone has their own job, I’m in charge of the laundry. The director of the penitentiary police gave me two hours, obviously accompanied, to go to Picardi boxing where I have the opportunity to train.” The structure is private, so Di Napoli needs support: “My father Gianni (a good former Pro boxer), friends who collect, sponsors and Toni Effe (very well-known rapper, ed.), who is practically a brother to me.”
Still a long road
A phase of relative tranquility, but the road is still long: “At the moment there are ten years to serve, and once the sentences become final, in case of guilt I will have to return to prison. And it scares me.” A consideration that makes him rewind the tape again: “I don’t blame anyone for this whole situation, only myself. I made uncomfortable friends at the wrong time and ended up in the spotlight. But it was my fault alone. My father, who also had some problems with the law, always told me. ‘If someone goes into a ravine do you follow him?’. And I was a dickhead, I followed that someone instead of looking the other way.”
The head that goes away, the self-harm
Crime after crime, every now and then a new charge cropped up. A situation that also seemed dead-end to Kevin: “An accumulation of stress has also created difficult moments for me on a mental level. Once I was stuffed with psychotropic drugs, I wanted to end it. On another occasion I committed an act of self-harm and severed a piece of my ear. When you see that those you grew up with go on holiday, start a family and you are locked up for having done everything wrong, your head risks going away. In this sense, boxing is my salvation.”
The rediscovery of true values
However, if detention served any purpose, it was to recognize true values: “As soon as I entered prison I received 50 emails a day, then little by little they reduced to 30, 20, 10. In the end my parents remained close to me and very few others. A bit like when someone dies. Everyone comes to the funeral and the first few days at the cemetery, many bring you flowers. But after a short time only dad and mom come to visit you.” Precisely for those who supported him without self or but, Di Napoli promises: “From now on I will only fight in the ring, it’s the best thing. Doing it on the street ruined my life.”
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– 2024-05-01 03:24:59
