A 37-year-old man has been arrested in Italy for driving a rented Maserati Levante down Rome’s iconic Trinità Dei Monti stairs.
CCTV footage captured the black vehicle driving down the Spanish Steps in the early hours of the morning earlier this month. Police were easily able to trace the car's licence plates back to the rental car company based in Milan and locate the driver of the bizarre stunt.
The Polizia Roma Capitale said in a Facebook post that they identified the driver of the rented SUV and arrested him at Milan Malpensa Airport when he attempted to return the car.
The stunt reportedly caused damage to the iconic staircase, with fractures to the 16th and 29th steps of the right-hand side. They had to be temporarily fixed so pedestrians could continue to use them.
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Rome’s heritage protection body says some of the fragments had to be reattached to the stairs, but there's still more repair work to be done.
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“Widespread chippings, scratches, abrasions, and deposits on both ramps of the second level, attributable to the same event” were discovered after the incident.
The Spanish Steps run from the Trinità Dei Monti church to the Piazza di Spagna and were constructed between 1723 and 1725. They have become one of Italy’s most popular tourist attractions.