In Italy, controversy has been generated by a court decision that exonerated a school caretaker of molesting a student since the incident lasted less than 10 seconds.
The 66-year-old man who was accused of sexual assault was declared not guilty by the judges of the Court of Rome’s Fifth Criminal Section because they determined that the entire incident lasted “about five to ten seconds.”
According to RAI, the girl, who was 17 at the time, testified that the crime occurred in April 2022 when she and a friend were ascending the stairs at school.
She testified that she pulled up her trousers and felt a hand tucked inside them, under her briefs, touching her buttocks, according to the judgment, issued July 6.
“Love, you know I was joking,” the janitor said, according to the teenager’s testimony mentioned in the judgment.
During the trial, the janitor admitted that he had touched the student but that he had done it “as a joke.”
The judges accepted the defense’s argument that the act was meant to be a “clumsy joke” without “libidinous intent” towards the girl.
The decision caused outrage among students and sparked a viral trend on social media.
A local union representing high school students, ‘Rete degli Studenti Medi del Lazio,’ said on Facebook that “this is not a joke, there is nothing funny about it.”
“It is unacceptable that we cannot feel protected at school. Once again, the patriarchal system has won, with the tacit support of institutions and politics. This model does not represent us, we will always be on the other side of the fence, for a safe society based on respect,” they said Tuesday.
Meanwhile, Italians have taken to Instagram and TikTok to post videos of themselves touching a sensitive part of their body for 10 seconds, marked by a timer, in an attempt to show that it actually is a fairly long period which can make people uncomfortable and change a person’s life. Accompanying the media are the hashtags #10secondi and #palpatabreve (brief groping).
Among those to take to social media were “The White Lotus” actor Paolo Camilli, who posted a video with the caption “shouldn’t the state protect us?” on his Instagram account.