ROME - - 19-year-old Leonardo Apache La Russa, the third son of Senate President Ignazio La Russa, is under investigation for an alleged sexual assault after a 22-year-old woman filed a complaint, according to Italian newspaper Il Fatto Quotidiano. 

 According to the woman's statements reported by the Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera, the violence took place on 18 May after an evening at a nightclub in Milan. The public prosecutor's office has yet to identify and hear witnesses’ testimonies and the investigation is in its initial stages.

 The prosecutor’s office must see if, six weeks later, the CCTV systems, both at the club and near the house where the alleged assault took place, have recorded and kept track of the footage.

 The investigation is being led by Deputy Prosecutor Letizia Mannella and Prosecutor Rosaria Stagnaro in coordination with Prosecutor Marcello Viola. The investigation has been entrusted to the mobile squad headed by Marco Calì. "It is a matter to be verified," prosecutor's sources said. 

 According to Fatto, “caution” is a frequently uttered word by the investigators, who are aware that given the time lapse between the events and the complaint, the investigation could be a challenge.

 "While we were dancing I noticed a school friend of mine, Leonardo La Russa. We said hello and from that moment on I don't remember anything,” the 22-year-old explained in her complaint. The last memory the woman has is of a drink, Fatto claims. The next morning, she recounts, she woke up “in an absolute state of confusion, naked in bed with Leonardo La Russa beside her,” who was also naked. 

 "I immediately asked him to explain why I was there, as I had no recollection of the evening," the woman remarked, “He told me that he had slept with me while on drugs and that a friend of his, who was sleeping in another room, had also slept with me without my knowledge.”

 The report in Fatto continues with the woman saying that at this point she wrote a message to the friend with whom she had gone to the club: "I don't remember anything, tell me about yesterday, was I drugged?". The friend replied: “You didn't listen to me, then you ran away because I couldn't find you anymore,” “you were fine until before the drink,” 'I tried to take you away but failed.”

 The same friend also claimed to have noticed her euphoric state and to have seen her kissing Leonardo. The 22-year-old then claimed to have seen, at around 12.30 p.m., Ignazio La Russa himself appeared “in the room seeing me in bed, and went away.”

 In the meantime, the girl asked for her clothes back, which “were downstairs,” but as soon as she was dressed, Leonardo insisted: “I demand a kiss, otherwise I won't let you out," Fatto explains.

 "He approached me and kissed me against my will. I didn't say anything out of fear,” the alleged victim further states. Fatto reports that once she left, she tearfully phoned her mother and later went to an anti-violence centre in Milan, where she was found to have bruises on her neck and a thigh wound. 

 According to Fatto, from the tests, the young woman also tested positive for cocaine, apparently taken before going to the nightclub and meeting Leonardo. The following day, Leonardo, again according to the young woman's account, contacted her on Instagram: “Out of fear I did not reply,” she explains. Together with her lawyer Stefano Benvenuto, she reconstructed the evening of the reported violence and filed a complaint.

 Andrea Bazzoni, lawyer for the La Russa family, said that, according to Leonardo's version: “There was no form of coercion: she agreed to spend the time after the club with my client, freely going with him to his home, spending the night and staying with him until the following day, and then saying goodbye normally.”

 “Leonardo,” the lawyer continues, in the Fatto article, “is very shaken.” As for what the girl purportedly took: "Not only does he [Leonardo]  exclude having offered it to her, but, should he be accused of this type of conduct, he would be forced to press charges.”

 The young woman's lawyer, Stefano Benvenuto, limited himself in his comments for the moment to stating that “this is a delicate matter”, without making any further statements. 

 The president of the Senate, on the other hand, issued a note defending his son, to whom he says he has “no reproach” to make, certain that “he has not committed any criminal acts.” Rather, Fatto explains, La Russa casts “doubt on the account” of the girl who, he emphasised, “had already taken cocaine.”

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