Opinion: What remains after the murder of Giulia Cecchettin

The murder of Giulia Cecchettin on Nov. 11 has drawn attention to Italy’s situation about femicides. She was a 22-year-old young woman who was killed by her ex-boyfriend named Filippo Turetta. Five days later, Giulia was supposed to major in Biomedical Engineering at the University of Padua.

Cecchettin was the 105th woman killed in Italy since the start of 2023, but the number has still steadily increased, according to Agenzia Italia.

In November 2023, 53-year-old Italian woman Vincenza Angrisano was stabbed to death by her husband, Luigi Leonetti in Andria, Puglia. The husband “did not accept the end of the marriage,” according to Italian publication Today.

Despite the emergency dispatcher indicating the proceedings to perform, the murderer repeatedly refused to provide her first aid; since the victim was still breathing, according to La Repubblica.

He wanted her to die.

On the same day, another femicide occurred: Meena Kumari, a 66-year-old Indian woman was bitten to death by her husband with a cricket bat in Salsomaggiore Terme, near Parma.

As a 17-year-old young woman living in Italy, I continue to reflect about all these women that are violated, persecuted and murdered. In my country, every three days a woman is killed. Women are not protected, believed or heard; I see it every time that I read the newspapers that women are completely left alone.

According to La Repubblica, on the evening of Cecchettin’s disappearance and murder, a witness called 112 (Italy’s emergency number) to report an aggression in the parking lot of Cecchettin’s hometown, Vigonovo; but the call was ignored.  

When local authorities found Giulia Cecchettin’s body on Nov. 8, 2023. Inside me it prevailed nothing but disappointment; because I knew that our society failed once again to protect young girls and women. Then what is the meaning behind celebrating on March 8 – the International Day of Women’s Rights – if everyday the same rights are neglected?

I have never met Cecchettin, but through the pictures, I can tell how much of a smart, kind, great soul she was and how much her smile brought joy. With her qualities, to me she embodies all the young women in the world.

Her story has shaken me deeply: I wish to fight for my future and for all other women, for my mother, for my sister. In the future, I will not be afraid to walk alone at night, I won’t be worried that my friend isn’t returning home.

 “I killed my girlfriend” were the first words said in Italian by the 22-year-old Filippo Turetta when he was arrested in Germany on Nov. 19. The anger when I first learned this phrase was immense, because Giulia wasn’t her girlfriend anymore; actually, she couldn’t stand him.

“I would like not to see him again, I would like to disappear from his life, but I’m feeling guilty, I am afraid that he could hurt himself in some way,” Cecchettin said to her friends in a WhatsApp audio. He was also telling her that he had stopped eating, that he was “super-depressed,” that he was spending days watching the ceiling. Filippo was playing with her sense of guilt, because as Cecchettin said herself, he was telling her these things not as a blackmail, but that looked very much like it.

The names of women lost to femicide must not be forgotten. Giulia Cecchettin could have been my own sister, my childhood friend, my former classmate or my neighbor. Every woman could have been her.