Horror as two American college friends are raped in Italy after being separated by two assailants as they walked home from a night out and were attacked in different places

Two American college students, aged 18 and 19, were raped after being separated by opportunistic assailants while returning to their hotel in the Sicilian city of Siracusa.

The suspects, described as local residents, are now being held at police stations.

The horrors took place on the night of July 3. The victims were returning from a night out in the Ortigia district and were in the marina when they were approached.

The attackers were on a scooter. According to reports in Sicily, the victims tried to use a cigarette vending machine, but were unable to do so because Italian machines require the buyer to have a national ID to verify age.

The two American citizens were separated when one of the boys offered to use a card. That’s when the attacks took place.

The attack here, in the city of Syracuse, on the island of Sicily

Italian police arrested the two men during two raids on the morning of July 5

One of the women was attacked near the marina, the other was reportedly taken to a house where she suffered the same fate.

Both victims went straight to the police the morning after the attack. The Siracusa vice squad launched an investigation and quickly identified the two men.

They were arrested on the morning of July 5, charged with aggravated assault and taken to a local jail.

The victims are both in Italy to study. A statement from the Public Prosecutor’s Office said the attackers took advantage of the two women’s lack of Italian to stage their attack.

The two women’s stories were supported by witness statements and investigations conducted at the scene, reports show. Corriere Del Mezzogiorno.

The U.S. State Department currently has a Level 2 travel advisory for Italy, which means travelers should exercise “extra caution.” This applies to U.S. citizens, but because of the potential for increased terrorism, not crime.

In April, a Canadian woman was raped in Palermo, Sicily’s largest city, in the B&B where she was staying.

The victim reportedly told police she met one of the two men, a hospital porter, when she visited her boyfriend in hospital after he suffered minor injuries.

She told officers that she and the doorman got to talking and that she invited him back to her bed and breakfast. The tourist described him as “very nice,” but “at a certain point I can’t remember anything,” she reportedly said, according to ANSA.

In 2019, an American woman was lured out of a bar by three Sicilian men and brutally raped in a nearby parking lot. three attackers were sentenced to four years in prison after appealing their original seven-year sentence.

Last month, two Italian footballers, Mattia Lucarelli, son of Italian left-wing football icon Cristiano, and Federico Apolloni, were sentenced to more than three and a half years in prison for gang-raping an American woman in an apartment in Milan.