Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni of Italy has shared an emotional post about an outrageous incident that took place in Turin, Italy, on Saturday, 29 August.
A 42-year-old Bangladeshi migrant shopkeeper lured a 13-year-old girl to the back office of his business with free snacks, where he molested her. The incident was captured on security camera, and the police arrested the suspect.
However, in a sick turn of events, the migrant offender was released from custody after just two days at a judge’s discretion. Reportedly, his lack of prior criminal record and his apology convinced the judge to let him go free.
‘A 13-year-old girl leaves home to buy lunch for her brothers. She enters a minimarket. She comes out devastated. A man is arrested on the charge of being responsible for that violence in a few hours. The public prosecutor’s office asks for prison. Two nights. Then out. The judge’s reasoning is: he was incensed, he showed himself to be cooperative, he said he was sorry,’ PM Meloni summed up the scandalous events at the beginning of her Facebook post.
Meloni went on to argue that the case raises questions about Italy’s justice system, noting that the police and prosecutors had acted quickly and according to the law.
‘We talk, rightly, a lot about public safety. We rightly ask the Government for an account of what is not going well. But here the question must be asked to the end. The laws we have written are more severe than ever. The police have done their duty, in a few hours, very well. The Prosecutor’s Office has asked for the harshest measure. The whole chain has worked. And then comes a decree that breaks it in 44 hours, and we can do nothing, except send the inspectors from the Ministry, which is what we are doing,’ she wrote. Her post has received over 166,000 likes on Facebook.
The incident sparked national outrage and made front-page headlines across Italy.
MP Paola Boscaini of the right-wing populist Forza Italia Party, part of PM Meloni’s governing coalition, also spoke up. ‘If we really want to protect women and fight violence against women, we cannot accept that a person accused of molesting a 13-year-old girl can be permitted to leave prison after 48 hours just because the judges said that he was sorry. The state is delivering a very dangerous message with this. It is unacceptable,’ she stated, as quoted by Yahoo News.
According to the young victim’s account, the migrant shopkeeper asked her how old she was and if she had a boyfriend before the assault, after which she left the shop in a ‘state of shock’ and ‘paralyzed’.
Before he attacked the child, the suspect also tried to lure an adult woman to the back of the shop, which was also recorded by CCTV footage. The adult woman, however, refused to follow him.
The prosecution is now appealing his release.
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