5 ex footballers convicted of gang raping student

(ANSA) - ROME, JAN 31 - Five former footballers at Serie C club Virtus Verona have been found guilty of gang raping a 20-year-old female student in January 2020, local newspaper L'Arena reported Tuesday.
    They were sentenced to six years each in jail by preliminary hearings judge (GUP) Paola Vacca.
    The five former Virtus players are: Stefano Casarotto, 26, from Venice; Gianni Manfrin, 29, from Padua; Edoardo Merci, 23, from Verona; Argentine Santiago Visentin; and Romanian Daniel Onescu.
    They all paid damages to the student, who has not been named, before the trial and she withdrew a civil plaintiff plea, but the prosecution went ahead automatically.
    The five were teammates at Virtus on the night of the rape, on January 18-19.
    The young woman said she was taken to a flat by one of the players, a friend of hers, where he and the others got her drunk and raped her. (ANSA).