The Modena prosecutor’s office investigated an officer of the Military Academy for private violence, stalking, threats or insults to an inferior. According to the accusation, Lieutenant Colonel Giampaolo Cati, 45, subjected some grooms of the stables, both women and men, to punitive and humiliating acts, such as frequently washing the horses’ genitals.
The facts date back to two years ago: the ordinary judiciary, which closed the investigations, took action following a report from the military judiciary of Verona. Sexist phrases and episodes of body shaming by the officer himself are contested.
The officer under investigation is still active within the Modena Academy, but has been transferred to another role, still within the Academy’s General Staff.
The alleged incidents were reported by the general, commander of the Academy, Davide Scalabrin, who collected the reports internally within the Academy itself.
Pm: continuous harassment of women
Continuous harassment of female staff, with sexual jokes, comments on physical appearance or stories about their experiences. This is one of the behaviors accused of Lieutenant Colonel Giampaolo Cati, 45 years old, head of the military equestrian center of the Modena Academy at the time of the events, accused by the Prosecutor’s Office of stalking 11 soldiers, seven men and four women, of violence private, facts committed between 2019 and 2021 with abuse of powers and authority, as well as threats to one’s inferiors.
The officer, defended by lawyers Guido Sola and Francesca Romana Pellegrini, received a notice of the end of the investigation, an act which usually preludes the request for indictment, signed by prosecutor Francesca Graziano. The alleged victims had filed a complaint. Eight of them are assisted by the lawyer Massimo Strampelli, who had already followed the case of ‘hazing’ reported to the Latina Air Force, suffered by the former officer student Giulia Schiff, whom he assisted.
The officer’s threats: ‘I will destroy’
“You don’t know what I’m capable of, if I want a person I’ll drive them crazy until they leave, if I want to hurt a person I’ll destroy them by hanging around their neck without giving them breathing space, I won’t leave them again until I’ve destroyed them. I would be capable of inventing anything about him, even personal ones, in order to destroy him and his family.” Words that officer Giampaolo Cati, a lieutenant colonel serving at the Military Academy of Modena, was also investigated for threatening and insulting a subordinate in the investigation by prosecutor Francesca Graziano. Among the insults, there are also references to the physical appearance and weight of women in service, and threats to have people transferred.
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