Man confesses to killing and then raping his niece
October 8th, 2010 - 4:14 pm ICT by IANSTaranto (Italy), Oct 8 (IANS/AKI) A 15-year-old girl in Italy was strangled to death and then raped by her uncle before he threw the corpse into a well to hide the crime, media reports said.
Michele Misseri admitted to killing his niece Sarah Scazzi 41 days after she disappeared in the Puglia region.
Misseri, 53, Wednesday broke down during a 15-hour interrogation and confessed to killing his niece who went missing Aug 26. An autopsy on her “unrecognisable” decomposed body showed signs of rape after her death, according to investigators in the city of Taranto.
“I strangled her with a cord while I was behind her and I raped her after she was dead,” he told investigators, according to unnamed sources close to the probe, who said the crime occurred in Misseri’s garage.
Misseri has been detained for kidnapping, murder and concealment of a body.
“This person confessed to killing the girl and he told us where to find find her,” said Taranto investigator Franco Sebastio, during a press conference Thursday.
The victim’s mother Concetta Serrano Spagnolo was appearing on a live national television show that aims to solve missing people and murder cases when she learned late Wednesday that police had located her daughter’s body.
Investigators’ suspicion that a family member could be involved in her disappearance was heightened when Misseri last month contacted authorities to say that he found his niece’s burned mobile phone not far from where she lived in the town of Avetrana.
“The finding of the mobile phone was virtually a way of saying ‘come and get me’,” Scazzi family lawyer Walter Biscotti, told AKI Thursday.
“It was done in a manner of a person who doesn’t know how to keep a secret,” he added.
- Indian kills wife in Italy for being 'westernized' - May 29, 2012
- 500 tonnes of 'cancer-inducing' waste seized in Italy - Jun 25, 2010
- 50,000 tonnes of dangerous waste found in Italy - Dec 23, 2009
- Olive tree in Italy to be named after Michelle Obama - May 20, 2012
- Journalist killed in Pakistan - Apr 20, 2012
- Five-year-old girl raped, murdered in Pakistan - Jun 03, 2012
- Reporter murdered in Mexico - Apr 30, 2012
- Murder case in Italy solved after 35 years - Jan 19, 2011
- Briton stabs, strangles niece in pornographic obsession - Oct 05, 2010
- Shahzad's widow to collect journalism prize - Jul 08, 2011
- 10-year-old boy kills kid of four - Dec 15, 2011
- Knox flies home after acquittal in murder case - Oct 04, 2011
- Rape-murder accused's acquittal reversed; gets life term - Feb 13, 2012
- Mirren haunted by bikini pic - Sep 23, 2011
- Court questions Uttar Pradesh on police station death - Jul 04, 2011
Tags: autopsy, biscotti, concealment, concetta, decomposed body, disappearance, family lawyer, family member, interrogation, investigators, misseri, missing people, murder cases, national television, niece, old girl, puglia region, spagnolo, television show, unnamed sources