Italy, shocked by the rape of a 13-year-old girl in Catania

LARA SIRIGNANO / CHIARA MARASCACORRIERE DELLA SERA / THE WORLD

CORRIERE DELLA SERA / THE WORLD

Updated Tuesday, February 6, 2024-17:37

There are six people in prison for the sexual assault that took place on the night of January 30 in the toilets of Villa Bellini, the public garden that overlooks the central Via Etnea, in Catania (Italy). On Monday, the juvenile judge had ordered preventive detention for three. The horror story of the victim and her accompanying boyfriend, who was beaten and kept away at the time of the rape, and the subsequent investigations have made it possible to reconstruct a network of accusations involving seven boys of Egyptian nationality. Two would have abused the girl, the others would have witnessed the violence.

The girl was in the company of her 17-year-old boyfriend when a group of seven boys approached and attacked them.

They beat him and immobilized him, they took her away from her, to the toilets in the green area

, where two of them abused her, while the other five watched her. It is a horror story delivered by the two teenagers to the Carabinieri and the magistrates of the two prosecutor's offices, the ordinary one and the juvenile one, who are investigating what happened on the afternoon of January 30, around 7:30 p.m. Six suspects have been arrested, while a seventh is missing: all are Egyptians and three of them are supposedly not of legal age.

Apparently, after the rape, the girl collapsed on the floor, crying from pain and shock, with her boyfriend by her side, who was also crying. It was some passersby who were walking along the central Via Etnea who noticed her presence and gave them first aid. The Arma soldiers, who intervened at the scene, collected the girl's testimony and began the investigations. Two investigations have been opened into the incident and the District Prosecutor's Office, with deputy prosecutor Sebastiano Ardita and substitute prosecutor Anna Trinchillo, and the Juvenile Prosecutor's Office, led by prosecutor Carla Santocono, have issued arrest warrants.

The events have shocked Italy.

Giorgia Meloni has promised that justice will be done

.

"Normal" young people

Those in charge of the reception centers describe them as "normal" young people, with "a healthy relational approach", they say, in contact with their families of origin that they left to seek their fortune in Italy.

They arrived in Sicily between November 2021 and March 2023. All of them would have arrived on the island's coasts as minors, facing the sea journey on a barge. Since they could not be deported because they were not yet 18 years old - the law prohibits this - they ended up in centers for unaccompanied foreign minors.

Two of the seven suspects cooperated with investigators. They allegedly did not rape the victim, but they certainly witnessed the rape and, like the others,

are accused of gang rape

. The first to agree, at the request of the operator of the center to whom he had told what happened, to speak with the carabinieri is 19 years old. The center of Catania is his first home in Italy. There he attends Italian courses and will soon begin training workshops followed by apprenticeships, a concrete gateway to employment. Generally, the boys are later sent to restoration, construction or tourism companies. The residence permit issued to the minors had expired and was waiting to be converted into a study-work permit. The court had already issued a favorable ruling. He did not speak Italian very well and his account of the night of the rape was translated for investigators by a cultural mediator.

On the night of the violent acts, another resident of the center was with him. He had arrived in the community a few months ago after being transferred from another center. Having recently reached the age of majority, his residence permit had expired and he had received a new document, the so-called long-term integration measure. After a period of training, he had started working in construction. "What happened shocked us," says lawyer Angela Pennisi, head of the community's immigration legal area, "the boy maintains the bond with his family of origin, he participated in parish activities and in animation and photography workshops... It is "a young man who has always shown a desire to commit, giving good opinions. I would describe him as a sweet person."

He too, like his compatriot who lived in the center, chose to speak with the Carabinieri. A few hours later, the friend went to the barracks along with an operator and told his version of the events. "I did not rape her," he reportedly said in broken Italian. In investigators' reconstruction, he would have witnessed the violence without intervening in defense of the victim. Unlike his friend, who was immediately placed under house arrest, he remains in prison. .