Together with Herbert Kappler, the German Gestapo chief in Rome, Caruso organised the massacre in Fosse Ardeatine on March 24 1944, as revenge for an attack the day before by Italian partisans on a column of German soldiers in Rome. 335 people, many of them belonging to a Communist military resistance group, were shot during the massacre.
After Italy's liberation from the German occupation, Caruso was tried for his numerous crimes, sentenced to death and executed in the courtyard of the Fort Bravetta in Rome.