Calenzano, a priest caught in a car with a child, defends himself: "I thought you were 15"

"I thought he had 15 years ". Don Paolo Glaentzer arrested in Calenzano (Florence) on the charge of badual violence against a bimba ] of 10 years, during the interrogation of July 24 before the afternoon. The priest confessed to having similar encounters with the child "at least three more times", reiterating that she had always been the child to take the initiative.

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"I did not know the age, I thought that he was still a few years, like 14, 15 years "said the prelate. The circumstance that the priest ignored the child's age would be denied, according to the investigating judge, by the fact that he stated that he knew the family for many years, since the Child was little more than a newborn. "I met this family about ten years ago," he would have said, "I went home once a month for dinner". The man also claimed to have helped the family, overwhelmed by economic and social problems – so that the children had been entrusted to social services -, and given them " about 7,000 euros in l & # 39; arc. "From the moment of arrest until today, I thought about what happened and I realized that I was wrong" he confessed to the Prato magistrate, Francesco Pallini. The child abuse that led to the arrest took place on the evening of July 23 near the family home. For the judge, the elder would lead the little girl taking advantage of his role as a priest and knowledge of his family.

The priest remains under house arrest. The preliminary inquest judge decided. The magistrate rejected the request of the prosecutor's office requesting the prison, accepting the defense thesis. "The choice of the precautionary measure of home summoning is technically flawless and well motivated," said Prato Valeria Fontana's lawyer, defender of the 70-year-old priest

when he was born there. 39, had not been surprised by two neighbors and then blocked by the carabinieri the priest could still abuse the child, the investigating judge wrote in the order that arranges the domiciliari at his home in a fraction of Bagni di Lucca (Lucca). For the investigating judge in the admitted facts, it is shown "obstinate rooting of the suspect in such deviant and illicit conduct". Still according to what the judge explained, the choice of house arrest was dictated by the absence of danger of pollution testing, since the 70-year-old man confessed, providing the same version of the facts before the prosecutor, July 24, during the examination of validation before the judge of instruction. In the decision, they then weighed the advanced age of the priest and the fact that he will stop the arrests in Lucchese, away from the house where the victim lives with his brothers and his parents.

The Prosecution for the Juvenile Court of Florence last January had requested the removal of the 10-year-old girl's family. For her and for the other two older brothers – as Corriere Fiorentino reports today – the request had arrived, but not the judge's decision in this regard. According to the newspaper, seven years ago, the older brother of the child was victim of an episode similar to that experienced by his sister: the boy, now twenty-two years old, at the 39, age 15, was found isolated with an adult. In the absence of objective evidence, the investigation was subsequently archived.