Francesco Schettino’s hometown initially closed ranks behind the Italian captain of the ill-fated Costa Concordia when tragedy struck, but as the case returned to court yesterday new doubts are creeping in.

An international figure of fun, the man dubbed “Captain Coward” in the tabloid press for apparently abandoning the luxury liner before passenger evacuation was complete is still seen by locals on the Amalfi Coast as a “scapegoat” although not without some blame.

“We’re not all Schettinos!” said Antonio Cafiero, owner of a beachside restaurant in Meta near Naples, a town of 8,000 souls on a hillside overlooking the Mediterranean, where seafaring is a way of life for much of the population.

“He’s put us in a bad light,” said Cafiero, a former crewman on an oil tanker whose family are the last builders of wooden boats in the town –heirs of a proud local shipbuilding tradition going back to the Middle Ages.

Arrested for a few days after the January 13 crash, Schettino has since been released and has been living in Meta for the past nine months – first under house arrest and now on probation.

As he sipped an aperitif at a local bar, Antonio Ferraiuolo, a former teacher at the nearby Nino Bixio Nautical Institute at the time Schettino studied there, said the incident had cast a dark shadow on the town.

“I’m bitter about the way the whole sector has been treated in these months. We’re not some little fishing village!” said Ferraiuolo, who is now retired.

“He was a captain who took risks. There’s a character problem there. He went right up to the edge of the cliff and this time he fell down,” he said. (AFP)