Overview

• A 17-year-old discreetly made the internationally recognized hand signal for help toward a passing woman, prompting her to call her father, who intervened and contacted the Carabinieri.
• The father, a 40-year-old Peruvian resident, says the girl shook her head when asked if she was okay before she ran to him, and the man with her fled.
• Investigators report the two met earlier that day after the girl fell near a bus stop and that the man then allegedly groped her on a park bench in a Vimodrone park.
• Carabinieri located the suspect that evening in a shared flat in Cologno Sud and detained him on the Monza prosecutor’s order on a sexual violence charge.
• He remains in custody pending a validation hearing before Judge Angela Colella, and his court-appointed lawyer, Silvia Dell’Oro, says he denies the accusation and claims consent.