At the court in Catania, Sicily, the prosecutor requested seven years and four months for two defendants and seven years and six months for their third accomplice at Monday’s hearing in the case of Moroccans accused of group sexual violence committed against two Hungarian tourists.
Judge Luigi Barone was preparing to announce the verdict, but the defendants’ defense requested a postponement for the second time, thus the judge set the next hearing for June 15. Until then, the three defendants will remain in prison in three different correctional facilities in Sicily.
The lawyers for the three defendants argued that they needed to review the statement presented by the victims’ legal representative.
The two 23-year-olds and one 25-year-old arrived in handcuffs, accompanied by eight prison guards, and sat on benches separated by bars in the courtroom. It emerged that at the time of the crime, they were in Italy as illegal immigrants and were earning money picking cactus fruit in the Catania area.
The first to speak was prosecutor Mariolina Banno, who gave a detailed account of the events of August 27 last year.
The two young Hungarian women and the Moroccan men met on the beach in Catania. The two women agreed to let the men drive them to their accommodation in their vehicle. However, the men deviated from their original route and sexually assaulted them in the vehicle.
The prosecutor confirmed that the defendants committed sexual assaults when they continuously touched the women’s private parts against their will.
He emphasized that the only thing that saved the two women was that one of them was able to notify her brother, describing the vehicle and its license plate number to him. The girl’s brother alerted the local authorities. The police arrested the gray van in which the two women were traveling in Paternò, not far from Catania.
The women said no, rejected the men’s advances, cried and screamed, repeatedly asked to be let out of the vehicle, were paralyzed with fear, and were terrified that they would be kidnapped or killed.
The third Moroccan man got into the car at an isolated spot and forced the girls to consume cocaine under threat.
After stopping the vehicle, the gendarmes accompanied the women to the nearest hospital, where, as the medical report confirmed, they arrived in a traumatized state.
The two victims’ accounts were consistent and corroborated each other; they did not make anything up, the prosecutor emphasized.
The prosecutor requested seven years and four months for Marof Hamza and Ahab Marvan, and seven years and six months for Barsan Sufian, who possessed the drugs.
Catania, Italy. Photo: Pixabay
Marof Hamza and Ahab Marvan made spontaneous statements with the help of an interpreter. They first claimed that they only wanted to help the women, then rejected the charges and claimed that the women possessed the drugs.
The judge interrupted the defendants several times, asking them why, if their statements were true, they had waited until now to say so and why they had not said so earlier. When the defendants claimed that they could prove their statements with video recordings, the judge asked them to present the recordings, but the defendants were unable to do so.
In his speech, Massimiliano Scaringella, the lawyer representing the two victims, said that the defendants were trying to make the unacceptable acceptable.
He added that Sicily is full of tourists who, when they get into a car to ask for a ride, do not think they are putting themselves in danger.
The Hungarian tourists were expecting a happy, sunny, problem-free vacation, but their stay in Sicily turned into a nightmare, said Massimiliano Scaringella.
He added that walking through the streets of Catania, you can still hear many Hungarians everywhere.
He stated:
Hungarians love coming to Sicily, they want to continue coming, and they have the right to visit here safely. We Italians have a duty to welcome them in complete safety so that their stay is carefree.”
After the trial, Scaringella emphasized that since this was an expedited proceeding, the prosecutor requested a one-third reduction in the sentence, which means that he views the events extremely seriously and calculated more than ten years per person.
He believed that the defense requested additional time, but in fact there was no legal reason for this, they were just trying to stall for time.
As for the defendants’ statements, Scaringella said they were completely meaningless. “According to the defendants’ version, the young women locked themselves in a vehicle and refused to get out. These statements are completely implausible and do not explain why the women called the police if everything was fine,” said the lawyer.
He added that cultural background was a decisive factor in the case, as “the Moroccan men believed that once the women had got into the car, they could do whatever they wanted with them. The women had no say in the matter, they couldn’t ask to get out, or simply think that they were just asking for a ride, nothing else.”
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Moroccan Migrants to Remain in Custody in Sicily over Alleged Assault on Hungarian Tourists
Italian prosecutor vows full justice as suspects face group sexual violence charges; case cracked thanks to victim’s quick-thinking sister and phone tracker.Continue reading
Via MTI; Featured image: Wikimedia Commons
The post Sexual Assault in Sicily: Prosecutor Calls for Long Prison Sentences appeared first on Hungary Today.
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