Naples – Another night of horror in Porta Capuana, one of the most run-down and dangerous areas of central Naples. A 30-year-old woman was raped while returning home, attacked from behind by a man who surprised her near Castel Capuano, in the heart of the railway district.
The attacker, a North African immigrant without a residence permit, was arrested shortly afterward by State Police officers, who intervened thanks to the prompt intervention of a passerby and a security guard who witnessed the scene.
The attack at dawn
The nightmare began shortly before 5 a.m. The victim, a Neapolitan woman returning home, was suddenly grabbed and dragged into a dark corner near the ancient walls of Porta Capuana, where the man allegedly abused her.
A few meters away, a woman noticed the scene and raised the alarm, attracting the attention of a security guard on duty at the entrance to Castel Capuano.
The intervention was immediate: a few moments later, the police assisted the victim and alerted 118. The young woman was transported to the Pellegrini Emergency Room, where doctors found bruises and injuries consistent with sexual assault, discharging her with a prognosis of twenty-one days.
The arrest of the suspect
While the woman was being treated, patrol cars from the General Prevention Office combed the streets in the area until they located, a few dozen meters from the scene of the attack, a man with the characteristics described by witnesses.
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The man is an undocumented North African, already known to law enforcement, who was stopped and taken to the police station. He was questioned in the hours that followed, and his status is now being assessed by the Naples Prosecutor's Office, which is coordinating the investigation.
The police also acquired footage from video surveillance cameras installed along the Via Carbonara and Piazza Enrico De Nicola axis, to accurately reconstruct the events and verify any previous movements of the attacker.
Porta Capuana, a forgotten square
What happened is not an isolated incident. Porta Capuana, historically one of Naples' most beautiful monumental gateways, is now a neighborhood experiencing profound social distress.
After dark, the area transforms into an open-air drug dealing hub, where small-time dealers, vagrants, and groups of immigrants jostle for territory. It's not uncommon for fights, assaults, and score-settling to break out at night.
In this very area, between Via Poerio and Piazza San Francesco di Paola, the police are forced to intervene almost daily for arrests related to drugs, theft, or violence.
And it's not the first time a woman has been attacked: just two years ago, another episode of sexual violence shocked residents, but the situation hasn't really changed since then.
The anger of the residents
"Here at night it's a no-man's land," says a local shopkeeper. "After a certain hour, you don't see a patrol anymore. Drug addicts, dealers, drunks: it's a constant decline. We're no longer safe."
Words that sum up the frustration of those who live and work in the alleys of a neighborhood whose only historical aspect is its name, while the reality is one of abandonment and fear.
The security alarm
Yet another episode of violence dramatically brings the issue of urban safety in central Naples back to the forefront of the debate.
Despite extraordinary controls and promises of redevelopment, Porta Capuana continues to be a crossroads of illegality, a symbol of a degradation that has resisted the passage of time and governments.
The hope now is that the attacker's arrest and the outcry this incident has sparked will finally push the institutions to restore dignity and safety to an area that once represented the city's most noble gateway.
Comments (1)
What's happening at Porta Capuana is truly sad, but it's not the first time we've heard of similar violence. Unfortunately, security seems to be a long-standing problem in this area. Institutions must do more.