An asylum seeker from Bangladesh is in custody facing accusations of raping and impregnating a 10-year-old girl at a migrant reception center in Italy.
The 28-year-old suspect is charged with aggravated sexual assault following the attack in San Colombano di Collio, Brescia.
The assault was brought to the attention of the authorities on Oct. 1 after being reported by the child’s mother who had noticed drastic changes in her daughter’s behavior.
According to QuiBrescia, the accused befriended the mother and his victim, both of whom were fellow asylum seekers staying at the facility, which accommodates around 20 migrants.
After the attack, the girl became distant, raising alarm bells with her mother who, with the assistance of staff at the reception center, later discovered that she was pregnant.
The man was arrested and remains in police custody. During an initial court hearing, he reportedly broke down in tears but remained silent through the proceedings.
The child and her mother have since been transferred to a protected location in the Lower Brescia area where she is receiving psychological support from a team of specialists.
Local media confirmed she had an abortion following the attack.
Local authorities are now investigating the facility which had previously been a focal point of protests in 2015 when locals opposed the housing of migrants in the former Hotel Il Cacciatore. The outrage of local residents however fell upon deaf ears, with local officials approving the location to house migrants.
Despite the attack, some local leaders insist the relationship between the migrants and residents has been nothing but positive, calling the climate in the village “one of peaceful coexistence.”
“This episode has nothing to do with migrants; we get along very well with them,” claimed Don Battista Dass, a local parish priest. “If I hadn’t read the newspaper, I wouldn’t have known about this horrible event; in the four years that I’ve been here, I’ve never seen or heard anything problematic in the village because of migrants,” he added.
The manager of the migrant facility, Giovanni Cantoni, also defended his residents. “I get along very well with them, better than with many Italians. And I have never, I repeat never, had any problems.”
Local mayor Mirella Zanini, however, struck a different tone.
“There has never been integration with the migrants hosted in the center, unlike with other foreigners present in the country for work reasons,” she said. “People never accepted that these young men were walking around the streets of the town doing nothing.”
Despite her criticism, she urged the public to refrain from protesting their stay, insisting, “Problems are not solved by creating chaos.”
