The prosecutor had requested a 20-year and 8-month sentence for the 16-year-old. Aurora Tila died on October 25, 2024, after falling from a seventh-floor balcony of the building where she lived. The mother says justice has been done. The young man's lawyer says we will appeal.

Aurora Tila did not commit suicide, nor was the fall from the seventh floor that forever shattered her 13 years on October 25th last year an accident. This was established by the Juvenile Court of Bologna which sentenced the 16-year-old who was 15 at the time and with whom the girl had had a flirtation, accused of the aggravated murder of the Piacenza girl to 17 years in prison. The 16-year-old has always maintained his innocence, speaking of a voluntary act. Prosecutor Simone Purgato had requested a 20-year sentence and charged him, in addition to the aggravating circumstances of the victim's minority and the romantic relationship, also with stalking. I am satisfied with the 17-year sentence: I would have been happier if it had been 20, but at least justice has been done. I have always believed in justice, I have said it from the beginning, commented Morena Corbellini, the girl's mother.

The meeting between the two a year earlier on social media

That day, Aurora had left her apartment in Piacenza at 8 a.m., supposed to go to school at 9, but she told her mother she was going to have breakfast with her friends. Instead, she met the boy she had met a year earlier on social media and had been dating for a few months. Not an engagement, the victim's mother, Morena Corbellini, has always maintained: Aurora was only 13 years old, almost a child, a tiny little thing in her body who also suffered from eating disorders, a troubled childhood with a father who had lost parental rights. A life and feelings still too immature to be considered a relationship. But the meeting with that boy, her first crush, had exploded in just a few months into something bigger than herself: the 15-year-old had proven obsessed with Aurora, seeking her out excessively, following her. One morning, her mother says, he tried to stop her from entering school. Morena Corbellini had asked social services for help, but no one was able to intervene in time.

Broken bones, bruises, and injuries before the fall

Then the appointment that October 25, 2024, in the building next to the one where the 13-year-old lived with her mother, the boy had sent her a message at 1:00 AM. For more than an hour the boys remained arguing, fighting, many heard, in the building across the street. They could have saved her, Aurora's mother repeats again. The screams, two witnesses see her clinging to the railing while she screams with all her strength but he, they told the police, was hitting her knuckles with his knees to make her fall. There was no escape for Aurora, her heart stopped beating thirty seconds after she fell to the fifth-floor terrace. But the autopsy would also reveal more: broken bones, bruises, injuries that would have been inflicted before the fall. A hell that made Aurora one of the youngest victims of femicide.

The 16-year-old's lawyer: The reliability of the witnesses is being questioned.

Prosecutor Simone Purgato had also requested an eight-month prison sentence for illegally carrying a screwdriver, found on the boy. The victim's mother is being represented by lawyers Anna Ferraris and Mario Caccurri. The 16-year-old defendant, on the other hand, is being defended by lawyer Ettore Maini and his colleague Rita Nanetti. The conviction does not meet the prosecutor's requests, and during our arguments we highlighted that the audio recordings of the witnesses' statements say something more than what was reported, and above all, they contradict certain aspects of the statements. Therefore, the credibility of the witnesses is in question and we will certainly appeal, said Maini, one of the 16-year-old's two lawyers.

The mother and the association in the name of Aurora

In the morning, entering the courtroom, the victim's mother stated: Beyond a mental imbalance, the defendant killed Aurora because he's a natural killer; people are born that way. Did he kill her out of jealousy? Maybe. Possession? Definitely possession because she said no, she didn't want him anymore. Corbellini then confirmed that he wants to create an association in Aurora's name, with the aim of going out and informing and helping young men and women who have problems not to trust people like the one my daughter encountered, to ensure that certain situations don't happen again.

Testimony of a cellmate of the accused

In recent weeks, the closed-door trial witnessed the testimony of a cellmate of the defendant at the Pratello juvenile prison: he stated that the 16-year-old confessed to the crime, adding that, as she, Aurora, clung to the railing, he screamed,"Why are you doing this to me? I love you." Perhaps a last-ditch attempt to save herself. The trial was conducted under the abbreviated procedure, which entitles a reduction of one-third of the sentence.