It was not voluntary murder but ill-treatment that was aggravated even by the death of the victim. The Court of Assizes of Appeal of Milan overturned the life sentence decided in the first instance against Alija Hrustic, who in 2019 in the Lombard capital killed Mehmed, her two and a half year old son.

With the redevelopment of the crime, from murder to ill-treatment, and the exclusion of torture, the man - 26 years old of Croatian origin - was sentenced to 28 years in prison.

Hrustic was also acquitted of aggravated mistreatment of his wife with the formula "because the fact does not exist". The reasons for the sentence are expected in 40 days.

The deputy pg of Milan Paola Pirotta had asked the judges to confirm the life sentence.

THE DEFENSE - The Hrustic case was the first in Italy in which torture was contested in the context of violence in the family. "Far be it from me to say victory or defeat in a process behind which there is an unbridgeable human tragedy", the words of the defendant's defender, the lawyer Giuseppe de Lalla. "Net of all rhetoric, I believe that the defensive thesis is the closest to a procedural truth that can be superimposed on the factual one". According to the lawyer, the first degree sentence already highlighted the "gaps" and "contradictions" in the story of his wife who witnessed the violence.

A NIGHT OF TORTURE - The atrocious crime took place on May 22, 2019, in the public apartment where the family lived in the San Siro area. According to the investigation of the Flying Squad, to cause the death of the little one, after he had suffered the violence of his father for the whole night and for the previous two days, including cigarette burns and burns with a live flame on his feet, were some blows on the forehead.

"The child was complaining, I could not sleep, I got up and beat him, I saw that he was no longer breathing, I didn't think I would kill him," the 26-year-old told investigators.