The courtroom returns at 10:30 a.m., with the regular three-member panel of judges from the Tempio Pausania Court who conducted the trial for gang rape of two young women. The defendants are Ciro Grillo and three of his Genoese friends, Edoardo Capitta, Vittorio Lauria, and Francesco Corsiglia . The decision was made by the CSM at the request of the Court itself.
The Superior Council of the Judiciary has in fact ordered the appointment of Judge Alessandro Cossu to the Sardinian court—he began his service in Asti at the beginning of the month—for all necessary hearings until the verdict is handed down.
The presiding judge, Marco Contu, who suffered a serious loss before the September 3 hearing, has returned to work. The hearing will resume with the final replies from Grillo Jr.'s defense team, after which the judges will retire to deliberate on the fate of the four defendants.
It is not known whether the four will be present in court, nor is the presence of the main accuser, the Italian-Norwegian student, then 19, who reported the alleged rape to the Milan Carabinieri a few days after the alleged events: it was the night between July 16 and 17, 2019, in the Grillo family's villa in Porto Cervo. The lawyer representing the girl, Giulia Bongiorno, had anticipated that she would be present, but also clarified that no final decision had been made. If she were present, the trial would return to closed session: journalists were admitted only in the final stages.
After the eight-hour closing argument, which was spread over two days, concluded on July 10th, prosecutor Gregorio Capasso requested a nine-year prison sentence for all defendants, with mitigating circumstances provided for by the penal code. The prosecutor believes Grillo Jr. and his friends are "unreliable" because they "adapted their version based on the investigation."
The defense, however, believes the four should be acquitted: the sexual relationship, they reiterated, was consensual, and it's the alleged victim who isn't credible. "A survivor of violence but dead inside," Bongiorno described her as opposed to this, expressing her hope for "a sentence that recognizes the validity of this very difficult complaint, and truly confirms that the choice to file a complaint in Italy still makes sense today."
