Police name man pulled from Canal

A man whose body was found tied to a supermarket in the Regent’s Canal has been named as a convicted criminal from Italy.

Police had told neighbours his body had been found inside a trolley, the Evening Standard reported at the time.

“Although formal identification has yet to take place, detectives are satisfied the deceased is Sebastiano Magnanini”.

He had reportedly travelled to Colombia, Cambodia and Thailand before moving to the English capital.

“His next of kin have been informed”.

A post-mortem examination has been inconclusive, and murder squad detectives are continuing to investigate his “suspicious” death.

Police were called by a member of the public on Thursday, 24 September, to reports of a body submerged in the canal, close to the entrance of Islington Tunnel.

Detectives have appealed for information from anyone who saw Mr Magnanini in the days before his body was found near the Islington Tunnel, not far from King’s Cross station. “There have been no arrests have been made and enquiries continue”.

DCI Reeves said: “This has been devastating for Sebastiano’s family”.

In 1998 he was jailed for 18 months after admitting to aggravated robbery and the painting was recovered after the theft, La Repubblica reported.

“I would like to hear from anyone who may have seen him in the Euston area at around 4.50pm – and we also believe he was in the King’s Cross and Caledonian Road area at around 6.50pm”. It shows the Virgin Mary as a young girl reading from an open book as her mother sits beside her and her father looks toward the skies. He was arrested three months later, and the painting (painting, whose worth, according to the Daily Mail, was placed at $1.5 million) was soon recovered at a warehouse near the Marco Polo airport.