Sexual violence against minors, priest sentenced to 4 years and 6 months in prison
The investigation was triggered by the complaint of a young man now in his thirties: «The bishop also offered me 25 thousand euros in cash for a 'scholarship', but I refused»
The Enna court sentenced Don Giuseppe Rugolo, the priest accused of aggravated sexual violence against minors, to 4 years and 6 months. The sentence was issued after 8 hours of deliberation.
The priest was also sentenced to a permanent ban from teaching in school and from holding public offices for five years. The judges declared the Curia of Piazza Armerina civilly liable, with damages to be quantified and paid separately.
The investigation began after the complaint from Antonio Messina, a young man now in his thirties, who told the Enna flying squad about the violence he suffered from 2009 to 2013 . The man, who was 15 years old at the time, denounced the priest: Antonio Messina attended the parish of San Giovanni Battista in Enna, where some episodes of violence allegedly occurred, when Rugolo, who is now 42 years old, was a seminarian.
The abuse , however, continued even after his ordination as a priest .
Messina, before reporting everything to the police, had also written a letter to Pope Francis . Then in 2018 he reported everything to the bishop of the diocese of Piazza Armerina Rosario Gisana, who opened an investigation previa. The proceeding, after reaching the ecclesiastical tribunal, was sent to the Congregation, now Dicastery, for the Doctrine of the Faith, which had not expressed its opinion due to lack of competence given that the violence allegedly occurred when Rugolo was still a seminarian. The Dicastery had therefore sent the documents back to Bishop Gisana who would have offered the young man's family 25 thousand euros in cash, taken from the Caritas coffers, as a "scholarship". Messina would have demanded the wording "compensation for damages" in the reason for payment and for this reason the negotiation would have failed.
At the end of 2019 Rugolo was transferred from Enna to Ferrara because he was "seriously ill". In October 2020, after a letter also sent to Pope Francis asking for justice, Messina reported everything to the police.
The investigation documents also include an interception between Don Rugolo and Monsignor Gisana in which the prelate states: «The problem is mine too, because I covered up this story. Patience, we'll see how we can get out of it...".
During the trial, which lasted 22 hearings, 53 witnesses were heard . The accused has sued for defamation, in addition to Antonio Messina himself, also four journalists who followed the legal case and Francesco Zanardi, president of Rete l'Abuso which deals with violence by the clergy.
(Unioneonline/vl)
