A black cloth will prevent the alleged victim of gang sexual violence from seeing the defense lawyers in the cross-examination scheduled today and tomorrow in the Court of Tempio Pausania, where the closed-door trial of Ciro Grillo and three of his Genoese friends, Edoardo Capitta, Vittorio Lauria and Francesco Corsiglia, who the prosecutor accuses of rape.
The judges decided this, in agreement with the parties, after the request for a protected hearing for the Italian-Norwegian student presented by her lawyer, Giulia Bongiorno, and motivated by the particularly delicate psychological conditions of her client.
The questions, however, will not be filtered by the President of the Court, Marco Contu, but will be formulated directly by the defense lawyers.
It was thought to make the hearing less burdensome by passing the written questions of the defenders to President Contu, who would then read them to the witness.
In the end the mediation proceeded which involves protection with the black cloth, so as not to make the girl's reactions visible and to prevent direct glances between her and the lawyers of the 4 defendants.
Two new key hearings, where the student is called to respond to the cross-examination of the defense lawyers.
A traumatizing exposure of the girl to the direct verification, in the courtroom, of the content of the videos documenting what happened on the night between 16 and 17 July 2019 in Porto Cervo in the Grillo family's villa.
The images, but also other photos posted on social media, should be shown between today and tomorrow during the young woman's deposition.
In November, the defense of the 4 defendants had confirmed their willingness to acquire the minutes of the statements made by the student during the investigation phase.
In this way, examination, cross-examination and viewing of the videos by the alleged victim would have been avoided.
However, the Prosecutor's Office and the civil party's lawyers responded that deposition in the courtroom is necessary.
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