Ravenna, 5 August 2023 – One day he had raised the iron out of curiosity: he just wanted to see how it worked. But the stepfather was so angry, he had snatched it from his hand and “he put it down here for me,” on his fingers, leaving a clear scar. Only one of the abuses of which a boy of foreign origin at the time residing in the Ravenna area spoke during a evidentiary incident held in recent days in front of the investigating judge Janos Barlotti and the psychologist Annamaria Capponcelli. The young man, who is now in a protected community, is entrusted to the social services and represented by the lawyer Chiara Donati as special curator. While mother and stepfatherinvestigated in competition for multi-aggravated ill-treatment, are defended by the lawyer Nicola Laghi.
The story, according to what was reconstructed in the police investigations coordinated by the prosecutor Lucrezia Ciriello, went on from February 2017, when the boy was only 8 years old, to May 2022. The young man was born in Ravenna: but at the age of one he was taken to his home country where he remained a guest of relatives. So after a few years he was back, he had attended the elementary school for one year and had been taken abroad. The definitive return had taken place in 2017, with mother and stepfather. And it was in that year that the alleged ill-treatment had begun.
On a couple of occasions the mother, for trivial reasons – continues the accusation – had it beaten up forcefully on the cheeks and upper body. And then he had also used one waist. And the belt had also been used by the stepfather to strike blows. The man had also used a electrical cable: he had wrapped it around the boy’s arm until he left a scar. However, “I also had signs in other parts of the body but you can’t see them anymore”.
The blows – according to what he reported – he took everyday, although not at the same time by both parents. And the stepfather also sometimes used ‘alternative’ methods: that is, in addition to an iron and cable, she threw chairs at him or lifted it off the ground and then suddenly threw it down.
And so the young man on at least two occasions, to avoid being punished with the usual violence, had decided to don’t go home. It happened in February 2022 when he was temporarily entrusted to family friends. In that period, after school, it had happened that he had got into a fight with a classmate. Once his mother, who was abroad, learned of the matter, she had called him and told him: “When I go back to Italy, you’ll see what I’ll do for you”. And so he, frightened, got on the train and went to another municipality; then he had wandered around until the evening until a compatriot noticed him and brought him home. Once mother and stepfather also returned, to the question “do you still run away from home?”, he had answered with a “yes” ending up targeted by the blows delivered by his mother even with a pot.
In May 2022 he had once again chosen not to return home. It had happened because, after school, he had started wandering around the city: and at that point, for fear of being beaten up for being late, he had decided to stay out. AND for a whole week he had lived hand to mouth and slept in a park. He had finally been noticed by a school group: at that point a police car had intervened and he had been entrusted to social services.
But what were the reasons that triggered domestic anger? According to the boy, this happened: “When I went to school, if the teachers said that I was misbehavingthey beat me”. Or again: “They told me I couldn’t watch TV because I behaved badly: and if I watched it secretly, they beat me”.