The hero police officer who shot Berlin Christmas market massacre suspect Anis Amri was a trainee who had only just joined the force.
Luca Scata, 36, fired at the alleged terrorist after the Tunisian national shot his colleague Christian Movio in the shoulder while shouting "Allahu Akbar".
His Facebook page has been flooded with praise from Italians with one friend telling Mirror Online: "I'm proud of him."
Luca – who is still on probation – was named at a press conference in Rome by Italian interior minister Marco Minniti.
Police have also released an extraordinary picture showing the other police officer recovering in hospital.
He is not in a serious condition after being shot in the shoulder and can be seen making a phone call from his ward bed.
He said: "These two extraordinary, extremely young men, simply by doing their duty, have done an extraordinary service to our community."
Terror suspect Amri had been asked to show his identity documents by police before pulling out a pistol on police who then returned fire hitting the suspect in the chest.
A major international manhunt had been launched for the Tunisian national who allegedly offered himself up as a suicide bomber for the Islamic State terror group before hijacking a truck and ploughing it into a Christmas market in Berlin.
The attack killed 12 people and injured dozens more but police initially arrested the wrong man giving the real perpetrator vital hours to escape.
Security officials have confirmed "without any shadow of a doubt" that the dead man is Amri after identifying him using his fingerprints.
The terror suspect had stepped off a train from France moments before the routine stop in the suburb of Sesto San Giovanni.
Amri pulled a pistol from his backpack and shot one of the officers in the shoulder while reportedly screaming 'Allahu Akbar' before taking cover behind a car as he tried to flee the scene.
After hearing of the shooting Amri's brother told a German reporter: "We are shocked and the whole family is in a bad situation. No comment.
Speaking at a press conference in Rome, Italian interior minister Minitti said: “During usual routine activity there was a police squad, they stopped someone who appeared to be a suspect.
“He immediately took a pistol out of his rucksack and shot at the police who asked him for documents.
"The person killed after a number of inquiries without any shadow of a doubt is Anis Amri, the presumed suspect of the terrorist attack in Berlin.
"He was the most wanted man in Europe and we immediately identified him and neutralised him. This means our security is working really well."
The shooting will raise questions about how the suspect was able to travel from Germany to Italy despite a major international manhunt being launched.
It is thought that Amri was radicalised in an Italian jail after meeting "extremist groups" when he was imprisoned for attempting to set fire to a school.
He had come to Italy by boat in 2011 after leaving Tunisia and told police he was a child refugee despite being 19 years old at the time.
The German federal public prosecutor's office said it is now in close contact with Italian security officials after the reports emerged.
It comes just hours after he was apparently spotted in Denmark hundreds of miles away from the scene of the attack.
Danish investigators were probing the possibility that Anis Amri travelled there from Germany after allegedly killing 12 after hijacking a truck.
A man walking his dog last night tipped off officers that he had seen someone matching the description of Tunisian national Amri in another area called Grenaa.
The Tunisian national's ID papers were found underneath the driver’s seat of the truck he became the most wanted man on the continent.
Police initially arrested a Pakistani asylum seeker in the aftermath of the tragedy, police on Tuesday announced they had captured the wrong man and were instead hunting for Amri.
A €100,000 reward was put up to catch the main suspect and investigators took the highly unusual step of releasing an uncensored picture of him to aid their search.
During his short time in Germany, he became linked to Abu Walaa, 32, a hate preacher whose sermons recruited young impressionable Muslims, sending them to Syria to fight for ISIS.
Walaa was arrested in Hildesheim, in the north of the country, in November alongside four others for recruiting radicals.
Amri arrived in Europe via Italy in 2012 when he slipped in alongside Syrian refugees.
Security sources in Tunisia believe he then spent some years in prison in Italy over the burning down of a school before applying for asylum in Germany earlier this year.
His application was rejected but he was allowed to stay because of red tape.
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