Virtus Verona, football players convicted of gang rape of a student

Raped after the game. It happened to a university student, invited to participate in “an alcoholic game” by five players, at the time in the Virtus Verona squad, returning from the move to Cesena. After more than two years of investigations, the investigating judge, accepting the requests of the Public Prosecutor’s Office, sentenced the players to 6 years each in prison.

The facts

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The story dates back to the night between 18 and 19 January 2020. Four players would take turns taking advantage of her, while a fifth filmed with his mobile phone. The girl would have ingested “a total of three 66 cl beers as well as a glass of gin lemon, maybe even two”. With that alcohol in my body “I didn’t feel well”, but “after a while”, when she “started to realize what was happening”, the victim claimed to have reacted: “I asked them to stop, also because I was in a state of total abandonment”. The players have denied any wrongdoing claiming that the young woman “was lucid and consenting”. Not for Judge Paola Vacca, who last Monday in an abbreviated procedure held them responsible for aggravated sexual violence. Hence the condemnation of Edoardo Merci, Gianni Manfrin, Stefano Casarotto, Guido Santiago Visentin and Daniel Onescu, the only one who did not abuse the student because he was dedicated to filming. The 6-year sentence and disqualification from holding public offices is also the result of the last minute settlement made by the parties (the victim was compensated by the defendants) and considered a mitigating factor, in addition to the reduction of the sentence by a third provided for in the shortened procedure.