Image: Wikipedia
In April I reported for Italy Magazine on this tragic story, in which a mother from Gela drowned her two autistic sons.
After investigation, 31-year-old Vanessa Lo Porto has been released from house arrest and the only constraint on her freedom is that she will never be allowed to live in Gela because of the sensibilities of her former husband and his family.
On that terrible day in April signora Lo Porto had recently lost her job, her marriage had broken up, she was caring for an autistic son and had just received the news that her younger son was also autistic. When she walked into the sea with her boys, says the court, she was not mentally capable of intending or wishing to murder them. In her confused and depressed state of mind, she could think only of saving them from lives of misery such as she was enduring herself.
It is my belief that the full consequences of depression are still not widely understood and my heart goes out to this poor woman.
Judge not that ye be not judged.
