The defense of Giulia Schiff, the former Air Force officer student who denounced having been the victim of hazing in the ‘baptism of flight’, asked to hear the former Defense Minister Elisabetta Trenta as a witness at the trial which is being celebrated before the Court of Latina against eight students on charges of private violence and personal injury with the aggravating circumstance of the competition. “There is an investigation underway, whoever has to pay will pay,” the former head of the department said at the time and now the lawyer Massimiliano Strampelli, Giulia Schiff’s lawyer, wants her to be heard on the witness stand. “We have cited the Ministry of Defense as civilly responsible because we dispute a responsibility of the intermediate commands, i.e. of those who had to supervise and did not do it”, underlines the lawyer to Adnkronos aiming to demonstrate that the rite “was ‘imposed’ on dissenting students even though not being expressly provided for by the regulations of the armed force”.
Everything revolves around the ‘baptism of flight’, a rite of passage for those who become pilots. According to Schiff it was not a ‘jolly’ at all, so much so that she said she suffered beatings and whippings before the usual ending, thrown into the pool water. Since then, the former student has changed her life: she left for Ukraine at the beginning of the Russian invasion to enlist as a volunteer in the International Legion of Ukrainian intelligence, then in the Masada team with the Kiev army and subsequently in the Special Forces of the In recent weeks, the International Legion has announced that she has married and has given up fighting to devote herself to charity and humanitarian missions with her husband, founding an organization to support both civilians and military. But for the next hearing in the trial, scheduled for March 20, she will return to Italy.
“Besides having changed my life, I have also changed myself – Giulia Schiff tells Adnkronos – Thanks to Ukraine I have gained an important awareness of what is the firmness of my will. I remember that day having insistently tried to free myself, but without happened, as far as I remember my strength was filtered by the fear of being excluded if I withdrew from the ritual against orders”. “I feel disgust at how a beautiful tradition has been crippled by unhealthy and degrading actions – underlines the former sergeant, who was later expelled from the Air Force – The damage to my dignity and my serenity lost in the following years is incalculable. I hope that the image and professionalism of all our pilot officers be cleaned up with a great test of justice towards those who are still unpunished”.
The hearing on March 20 could prove to be important: “I asked for the complete video to be viewed (of the ‘baptism of the flight’ ed) – underlines the lawyer Strampelli, who is also a professor of military law at Link Campus University – and that Giulia witnesses indicating what was done to her. We therefore expect a full reconstruction of the facts with the video in hand”. Meanwhile, time passes and the lawyer also sees “a prescription risk. We hope it does not happen and for this reason I will ask for a tighter scheduling of the hearings”, he underlines.
Source-www.adnkronos.com