Rape of female students, former gym teacher in prison

A former gymnastics teacher ended up in prison in Verona for sexually molesting six underage female students during the physical education lessons the man held at a middle school. An investigation that started in 2019, which now, with the conclusion of the appeal trial and the two-year sentence, has led to the issuing of a prison order for the 65-year-old man. The man, who has since retired, was taken to the Motorio correctional institution. The former teacher was also given the ancillary penalties of perpetual disqualification from any office pertaining to guardianship, curatorship and support administration, and perpetual disqualification from holding any office in schools of all levels.

The police executed the precautionary measure, issued by the Public Prosecutor's Office at the Venice Court of Appeal. The man was found guilty of aggravated sexual violence committed against six underage pupils attending the middle school where he taught. The case had been investigated by the Verona Mobile Squad, after the Verona Public Prosecutor's Office had received a report from some teachers at the school. The six girls had confided in them about the sexual harassment they had suffered from the physical education teacher. The girls had told them that the teacher, during gymnastics class, had not only addressed sentences with explicit sexual content to them, and had also made remarks about their clothing, but had also harassed them on the pretext of helping them with some motor activities. All the minors had been heard under the sheltered hearing formula by the staff of the Scaligera Mobile Squad and all of them had confirmed what they had already told the teachers. This version was then reiterated by the students also during the evidentiary incident. The Judge for Preliminary Investigations had then established that the 65-year-old had been suspended from teaching for the entire school year, given the aggravating circumstance of having committed the facts by abusing his profession and within an educational institution. Finally, the criminal trial concluded with a two-year prison sentence, and the former gym teacher was transferred to prison.