On our last trip, my husband may have come close to having his wallet taken. We had just gotten onto a crowded metro, having barely made it on. We were standing at the door. I noticed a well-dressed man in his twenties about two-to-three feet to my left and a well-dressed woman, also in her twenties, just at my left side. My husband was in front, with his back turned to me. The man and woman did not appear to be together, but I noticed that he made eye contact with her and almost imperceptibly nodded.
She moved to between my husband (specifically to behind his back pocket) and myself. I noticed she was carrying, not a shawl, but something fairly largish which hid her right arm--an arm which was closing the inches to my husband's back pocket.
It was at that moment that it finally occured to me--be alert! @:-) Until then, I had just been thinking how relieved I was that DH and I had made it onto the metro.
I said something like "Watch it!" to DH. A number of people turned around and stared. (The youngish man and woman never changed facial expressions. They might have been thinking of the moon, for all their faces indicated.) I moved so that I came between the young woman and my husband's back pocket.
Who knows if she had intended to pick his pocket? It could have been quite innocent. The two youngish people seemed quite innocent. Still--.
On a previous visit, while we were walking through Termini, I noticed a middle-aged man coming up behind us with his gaze fixed on my husband's back pocket. I made eye contact (think a smiling female Clint Eastwood attitude
) and we had no more trouble.
This time we also got ripped off by a cab from Termini. But that wasn't major. I actually felt sorry for the cabdriver. The cabdriver's boss at Termini had pursued us through the station arguing that their cab had a meter, etc., etc. He actually had pointed to something in the cab that he said was a meter. Well, it wasn't. And when we got to the Cavalieri, the cabdriver made an excuse not to go into the Cavalieri driveway but rather dropped us off at the front, presumably because his type of cab wouldn't be allowed in there. Anyhow--even if the cabdrivers were crooks, they weren't successful crooks. The overcharge was something like an extra 20 euros. Annoying, of course, but not anything like losing a wallet.
But yes, cabs at Termini can be a real problem unless they are metered.
And on subways, especially if you are near the doors and are distracted--you should be very watchful.