“You can’t take away the life sentence from a murderer who killed, without any reason, a 27-year-old girl. This is not justice”. Vincenzo, the father of Lorena Quarantathe 27-year-old killed by her boyfriend, Antonio De Pace, at dawn on March 31, 2020 in the house where they lived together in Furci Siculo, in the province of Messina. Both in the first instance and on appeal, the defendant had been sentenced to life imprisonment: he strangled his partner with his bare hands, presumably at the height of an argument, and then cut himself on the arms before calling the police. In recent days, the Court of Cassation annulled the second instance sentence, ordering a second appeal limited to the applicability of mitigating circumstances. The ermines believe that, in the overall calculation of the sentence, the judges of merit did not take into account the exceptional context represented by the Covid pandemic. In essence, the restrictions of the lockdown could have affected the conduct of the murderer. The question had been raised by De Pace’s defense in the appeal, which is why the Supreme Court deemed it necessary to postpone the case for a new assessment on the point. “Covid is not a mitigating factor. I wonder if these judges have a conscience,” Quaranta told the editorial staff of Il Giornale.
Mr. Vincenzo Quaranta, how did you react to the news of the new trial?
“My wife, my children and I were shocked. It was as if they had killed Lorena twice. And I really can’t explain how it was possible that ‘men of law’, I’m talking about the judges of the Supreme Court, who certainly read the trial papers, came to the decision to annul the life sentence of my daughter’s killer. It’s all in black and white, there are no ambiguous passages in the documents filed.”
Meaning what?
“De Pace was not scared of Covid, the pandemic has nothing to do with the motive for the murder. First of all because the virus had only started circulating a few days before and then because he was a nurse. In your opinion, is someone who does this job afraid of facing a health emergency? Not to mention that in those days he continued to go out with friends and ride his motorbike. But what are we talking about? He killed my daughter only because he had an inferiority complex towards her”.
What do you mean by ‘inferiority complex’?
“He didn’t accept that Lorena was a brilliant girl, about to graduate in medicine. He was annoyed by the idea that my daughter was fulfilling, with excellent results, the dream she had had since she was a child: to become a doctor. This is the one and only truth. There are messages that confirm it”.
What messages are you referring to?
“After the murder, my daughter Danila found some WhatsApp messages that Lorena had sent to De Pace. They were discussing precisely this inferiority complex. In one message she wrote to him that she preferred to be ‘the girlfriend of a nurse who behaves like a man and not of a rude doctor’. I think that’s pretty clear.”
Has De Pace ever shown any signs of disturbance or behaved in a worrying manner?
“No, never. He studied, played sports and apparently seemed like a good guy. In hindsight I came to the conclusion that he was wearing a mask, because he is a manipulator. It is useless to try to make him look like he is suffering from some kind of disturbance due to the Covid emergency. He was and has always been very lucid. He snatched the future away from a girl full of life and destroyed an entire family”.
What kind of girl was Lorena?
“You know how they say that parents are the pillar of the family? Well, in our house Lorena was the real point of reference for all of us. I remember that she was only six years old when she told us for the first time that she wanted to be ‘a doctor when she grew up’. And she would have become a good doctor, I’m sure of it, because she was a brilliant student and very persevering. Believe me, I’m not saying this because I’m her father, but Lorena was beautiful inside and out”.
What do you expect from this new process?
“In reality, both my wife and I are a little discouraged. Also because the idea that my daughter’s murderer could even receive a reduction in sentence for the crime he committed is disheartening.
Did the judges of the Supreme Court who decided to order the second appeal, believing that the defendant could be ‘stressed’ by Covid, also think about the suffering that Lorena unjustly endured? And did they think about us parents, who had to learn to live with this pain? If there is justice, as I believe and still hope, then there can be no punishment other than life imprisonment for the perpetrator of a femicide. I will fight to the end for my daughter”.