Four trials, 16 children separated from their family, two towns in northern Italy and a supposed satanic sect:
Los Diablos de la Baja Modena
.
That is the summary of a bizarre judicial history that began in the late 90s in the transalpine country and that 24 years later still resonates from time to time.
But to understand the case (or try it) better to move to 1997, to
the region of Emilia Romagna
, in the Italian northeast.
That is where the story of
Veleno
begins
, the city of lost children,
the documentary series that every Friday (11pm) broadcasts Crime and Investigation, based on the book and podcast by journalist Pablo Trincia.
It is May 17 of that year in the town of Massa Finalese and the police arrest Romano and Ivan Galliera [fictitious names], father and son belonging to a family at risk of exclusion.
They are accused of sexually abusing the little one of the family
, Dario, 8, who has been given up for adoption after losing his custody due to financial problems.
The minor declares to a psychologist, Valeria Donati, and his adoptive mother that, in the few visits he makes to his biological family, his father and brother abuse him sexually and that when he returns to his adoptive family he is unable to sleep and has continuous nightmares.
These statements, taken through interviews with the technique of progressive disclosure, are increasing the circle
.
Thus, more names begin to appear, such as Elisa, 3, and Marta, 8, from the nearby town of Mirandola; pornographic videos, and even
rituals in cemeteries with child abuse
. On July 7, 1997, at 4.30 in the morning, the police went to the home of Federico Scotta and Lamhab Kaenphet, Marta's parents, and began to search the house, taking family photos with them.
A few days later, both they and their neighbor Francesca Ederoclite, Marta's estranged mother, will be removed from custody of their children and
transferred to the Franciscan Cenacle, in Reggio Emilia
. They will not see them again more than once, when they discover their whereabouts. The parents move there, who from the other side of the fence, rebuked by the center's staff, come to Marta and throw a teddy bear with the note "your mother will always love you."
The psychologists of social services continue with the interrogations of the minors and the cases extend to a total of 16 minors who will be separated from their families for alleged abuse. The stories are getting more and more lurid with orgies, rapes in coffins and even beheadings, but
neither the videos nor the bodies nor remains of the satanic acts appear
. The local press already gives a name to the supposed band: Los Diablos de la Baja Modena.
Between January and April 1998, the first trial was held under the name
Pedophiles 1.
This resulted in 12-year sentences for Romano Galliera and Federico Scotta; 7, for Adriana, Galliera's wife, and 6, for Ivan, the eldest son. Another citizen, Alfredo Bergamini, designated as a photographer, and his partner María Rosa Busi, will receive 13 and 7 years of sentence.
Francesca, who had already taken her own life
before the judicial process,
remains without a conviction
, unable to endure the situation.
At the hearing, Ivan does recognize
"some touching" to his brother Dario but at the request of the minor and "as a joke"
.
"There is no time machine that allows me to rectify, but I wish there was because that was not true," he now acknowledges during the five-episode documentary series produced by Fremantle.
In November of that year the accusations continue to grow and also reach Lorena and Delfino Covezzi for allowing the participation of their four children in pedophile acts and the priest Giorgio Govoni is pointed out as the leader of a satanic sect that even uses a guillotine, throws corpses of children into the Panaro River and pays disadvantaged families to recruit the minors, who already number 16. Three more members of the Covezzi family will also be implicated and detained.
Thus began the
Pedophile 2
trial
with charges of sexual abuse and violent acts in cemeteries. Following the revelations of the minors, in May 2000,
the prosecutor asked to consider Govoni the head of the sect and sentence him to 15 years
. Two days later he dies of a heart attack and the sentence is not carried out, but he is considered the leader of the sect. The remaining sentences for 16 defendants amount to 157 years.
There were still two other trials involving more citizens and giving credibility to medical and psychological reports on the statements of the minors. Later, the Supreme Court would overturn the sentences and, in 2013,
the Court of Appeal pointed to "environmental poisoning" and to the fact that the psychologists who treated them "were objectively inexperienced
.
"
The journalist Pablo Trincia, author of the podcast and the book, in a statement to
Vice
in 2017
supported the technique of "false memories" of those interrogated;
Some of the minors implicated, in the podcast itself, point out that social services "brainwashed" them, and a few months ago, another of those implicated, in
La Reppublica,
indicated that their accusations were "invented" and "influenced by pressure from psychologists
.
"
But the case, far from dying down, is still active with requests for review of trials by the defendants and with the children (now adults) without having returned to their families.
According to the criteria of The Trust Project
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