ROME, Dec. 10 (Xinhua) -- Eight people including a teenager are under investigation in a deadly stampede that claimed six lives in a nightclub in a central Italian town on Saturday, prosecutors said in a televised press conference on Monday.
The incident took place in the early hours of Saturday during an emergency evacuation after someone allegedly squirted pepper spray into the crowd at the Lanterna Azzurra (Blue Lantern) night club in the town of Corinaldo in the central Marche region.
A metal railing outside one of the club's emergency exits gave way while hundreds of teenagers were trying to leave, causing dozens of people to fall on top of each other. Six people -- three girls and two boys aged 14-16 and a 39-year-old mother of four -- were crushed to death as a result. Deputy Prime Minister Luigi Di Maio confirmed the names and ages of the dead on Twitter on Saturday.
Seven people remain hospitalized in critical but stable condition. Of these, four are now able to breathe on their own, Dr. Abele Donati, the head of the intensive care unit at Ancona city hospital told Sky TG24 on Monday.
A 17-year-old boy was identified as having released the pepper spray and has been taken into custody on drug charges, Italian news agency ANSA reported.
The eight under investigation also include three owners of the company that manages the Blue Lantern and four owners of the building where the club is located. Charges include manslaughter and criminal negligence, according to ANSA.
"We are dealing with a multiple event, in which death was the consequence of one or more causes," Prosecutor Giovanna Lebboroni told a press conference broadcast on Sky TG24 private news channel. The pepper spray had "spread extensively" inside the club, she added.
Also on Monday, two more pepper spray incidents occurred in the northern Lombardia region. In the city of Pavia, 33 secondary school students were hospitalized after someone squirted pepper spray in the boys' locker room at the gym, ANSA reported.
In a town near the city of Cremona, a 14-year-old girl caused five classmates to be hospitalized after she squirted pepper spray at her school, Sky TG24 reported.
Interior Minister Matteo Salvini said that pepper spray is a key self-defence tool for women in cases of sexual assault, but that it must not be abused.
"Whoever abuses (pepper spray) must be arrested, even if they are minors," Salvini told Sky TG24.
