Castellammare, the victim's shocking story of a cellar nightmare: "He made me swear not to tell anyone."

Castellammare – “ I wanted to get out of the cellar, get away as quickly as possible, so I thought that by tidying up the cellar he would let me go. In reality, he forced me to stay for a longer time, I don't know how long. And he told me that everything that had happened had to be kept between us and that I shouldn't tell anyone.”

The 22-year-old victim of Romolo Russo, the 26-year-old arrested for kidnapping and rape, recounts the interminable minutes she spent in the cellar on Via De Gasperi in Castellammare di Stabia where the violence against her took place.

Russo thought what happened could be kept a "secret" because he told the girl, "People shouldn't know our business." The 26-year-old thought that keeping the girl locked up and forcing her to perform violent oral sex on her was perfectly normal.

“People shouldn't know our business”

In the complaint filed with the Carabinieri a few days after the assault, which occurred on the evening of August 2nd to 3rd, the 22-year-old recounts shocking details. Even more disconcerting is the 26-year-old's behavior before letting the girl go, when he holds her back, talking about his younger brother who died in a car accident he was also in (which occurred in 2024 between Gragnano and Santa Maria La Carità, ed.). He holds her back, showing off his tattoos inspired by the Joker and Thomas Shelby, the protagonist of the Peaky Blinders series, as well as the word "psyco" and the crest of Juventus, his favorite team.

 The Joker and Juventus' tattoos

The young woman tries to reason with him: “I told him that I didn’t think he was right in the head,” she told the police. “I didn’t say anything else because I wasn’t yet sure I was safe, away from him.”

And after everything that had happened, the unspeakable violence, the attempts to suffocate the girl to feel even more arousal, at a certain point shortly after midnight the 26-year-old told the victim that it was time, and so he moved the radiator that was blocking the door and let her out.

“Before opening the door, he made me swear not to tell anyone what had happened,” the 22-year-old said. “I immediately went to my car, where I sat for about five minutes, in shock from everything that had happened.”

Romolo Russo's personality is harshly criticized by the investigating judge. Mariaconcetta Criscuolo, in the precautionary order, "undoubtedly has a negative and highly dangerous personality," the judge wrote. "The seriousness of his conduct can be deduced from the 'nonchalance' with which he took advantage of a girl he met on social media, pretending to be a nice guy and luring her in for a meeting, then forcing her to satisfy his sexual desires."

According to investigating judge Russo, "he undoubtedly has a negative and highly dangerous personality."

According to the investigating judge, the suspect is "a person who didn't dare put any restraints on the victim, even when she tried to break free, just to give vent to his sexual perversions (think, for example, of the invitation to the girl to pretend to be dead)."

A nightmare experienced in the cellar on Via De Gasperi, also confirmed by investigators during their investigations.

As soon as the young victim gets into her car, she contacts a friend to tell him what happened, but the boy doesn't respond until the next morning.

It was the young man who advised her to talk to her parents and go to the hospital, and then report what had happened to her.

On the evening of August 3, the 22-year-old called 1522, the national anti-violence hotline, to ask for support. Shortly thereafter, she went to the San Leonardo hospital in Castellammare di Stabia where she was examined. Her body still bore bruises, abrasions, and signs of suffocation around her neck. In addition to the abrasions and neck pain, the doctors found she was also experiencing severe agitation and anxiety.

A few days later, the 22-year-old, with the support of the anti-violence center, decided to report everything to the police.

The girl's story, along with the details revealed by her attacker during the kidnapping and the assault, were verified by investigators and prompted the prosecutor to request and obtain a precautionary prison order, which was served on Romolo Russo this morning by the Carabinieri.