A top cop who is married with two children has been shot dead during a training exercise when a colleague’s gun went off while it was being cleaned.

Sergio Di Loreto was deputy chief of police at the Agrigento Police Headquarters in the city of Agrigento, which is located on the southern Italian island of Sicily, and was shot and killed when he was hit in the chest by the bullet at around 1 PM on Tuesday 23rd November.

He was one of several police officers taking part in a refresher course in use of weapons at the Soddi shooting range in Sardinia.

Di Loreto, 48, went to Sardinia a few days beforehand in order to participate in the course for police officers.

He and other colleagues were on the shooting range during the cleaning of the weapons, when one of his colleagues accidentally fired a shot that hit Sergio in the middle of his torso just above his abdomen.

Police Union national secretary Vincenzo Chianese said: “He was a dedicated and careful colleague, respected and well liked by all, a true professional.”

Immediately after the incident, the alarm was raised and doctors arrived on the scene by helicopter, but the police officer passed away shortly afterwards in hospital.

The public prosecutor has opened an investigation into the incident while the police attempt to reconstruct what exactly happened.

The police officer had worked for several years in the capital Rome before returning to his hometown of Agrigento.