A young Libyan man boards a barge to cross the Mediterranean. He leaves who is a student and professional soccer player, disembarks treated as a human trafficker.

L’Equipaggio – The Crew is the story of Alla F. Hamad Abdelkarim, a former Libyan footballer sentenced in Italy to 30 years for manslaughter and human trafficking. Arriving on Aug. 17, 2015 on a barge where 49 people died of asphyxiation, Abdelkarim was accused along with his other friends of being part of the crew and the organizing criminal network. The report traces the stages of this affair: from the shattered dreams of the migrants who traveled with him, to the shadows shrouding the trial, to the legal battle to obtain a review of the sentence.

“Here I am. I have been waiting for this moment for almost 10 years.”

So says Alla F. Hamad Abdelkarim to our cameras, the first to interview him, thanks to the permission and cooperation of DAP, the Department of Penitentiary Administration, which allowed us to enter Palermo’s Ucciardone prison in the summer of 2024, where most of the documentary is set.

On December 22, 2025, the President of the Republic, Sergio Mattarella, granted Alla Farah Hamad Abdelkarim a partial pardon, reducing his sentence of 11 years and 4 months. Between May and June 2026, the Court of Appeal of Messina declared admissible the application for a retrial for Alla and his two Libyan teammates and friends—Abderrahman Al Monsiff and Tarek Jamaa Laamam—who had been convicted alongside him. Pending the retrial, the execution of the sentences was suspended. Alla, Tarek, and Abderrahman were released from prison. The new trials are set to begin in October 2026.

Watch the documentary