A test revealed the child was pregnant.
A Bangladeshi asylum seeker has been arrested for allegedly raping and impregnating a 10-year-old girl in a controversial migrant centre in Italy.
The 28-year-old is accused of carrying out the heinous attack at a migrant centre in San Colombano di Collio, Brescia, in the region of Lombardy.
The centre is located in the Hotel Il Cacciatore and reportedly houses about 20 asylum seekers.
Among them are the alleged rapist and the young girl, who is from sub-Saharan Africa.
The mother reported the alleged attack on October 1, 2024, after her daughter showed sudden and “strange” changes in her behaviour, appearing cold and detached.
After the girl said she was sexually assaulted, she was taken to a local hospital.
A test revealed the child was pregnant. She had an abortion soon after.
The asylum seeker was arrested and charged with aggravated sexual assault. He was imprisoned in Brescia and is now awaiting trial.
Reportedly, the accused gained the mother’s trust as her neighbour and was often left alone with her daughter.
Following the alleged assault, the mother and daughter have been taken to a “protected” location elsewhere in Lombardy.
The girl is also receiving psychological support.
The pair were staying at the migrant centre while waiting for their request for international protection to be approved.
The migrant centre is now under investigation by the local prosecutor’s office.
In 2015, locals protested against the hotel housing migrants, but according to parish priest Don Battista Dassa, today there is a “climate of peaceful coexistence”.
Speaking about the rape case, he said:
“This episode has nothing to do with migrants, we get along very well with them.”
“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.”
Hotel manager Giovanni Cantoni added:
“I get along very well with [the migrants], better than with many Italians.
“And I have never, I repeat never, had any problems.”
Both the priest and hotel manager said they did not know about the assault until the girl’s mother reported it.