A 61-year-old Italian nurse has confessed to murdering her own son before dismembering his body with a hacksaw, claiming she killed him to protect his Colombian girlfriend from alleged domestic abuse.
Lorena Venier told prosecutors she committed the “monstrous” act alongside her daughter-in-law Mailyn Castro Monsalvo, 30, after months of escalating violence and threats by her son Alessandro, 35, against his partner and their six-month-old baby.
The gruesome murder has shocked the quiet town of Gemona del Friuli in north-eastern Italy, where Alessandro’s dismembered remains were discovered in a rubbish bin at the family home on 31 July, nearly a week after he was killed.
Police found the body cut into three parts and buried in quicklime in an attempt to mask the smell of decomposition. The discovery came after Mailyn, overcome with guilt, called emergency services to confess what the two women had done.
‘The Daughter I Never Had’
In a chilling confession to magistrates, Lorena revealed the disturbing motive behind the matricide, describing Mailyn as “the daughter that I never had” and claiming her son’s violence had become unbearable.
“Mailyn was being beaten up, insulted and threatened many times with death,” the nurse told the court during a hearing on 2 August. “My son downplayed the post-natal depression she was suffering from. Alessandro was violent, Mailyn’s life was in danger.”
The breaking point came when Alessandro, who was unemployed and refused to help around the house, announced plans to move the family to Colombia. Lorena feared the move would isolate Mailyn from any protection.
“I could not have allowed them to go to Colombia, Mailyn and the baby would have run very serious risks there,” she said. “The only way to stop him was to kill him.”
Six Hours of Horror
The murder, which prosecutors say was premeditated, took place on 25 July – just two days before Alessandro had planned to fly to Colombia with his partner and child. The women had even ordered quicklime through Amazon in advance, evidence of their calculated plan.
According to Lorena’s detailed confession, the killing took six agonising hours to complete. The women first spiked Alessandro’s lemonade with tranquilisers around 5:30pm, but when he didn’t fall unconscious, Lorena injected him with two doses of insulin she had taken from the hospital where she worked.
“I had kept them at home for about five years,” she admitted. “I had taken them from work because at the time I had decided to use them to kill myself.”
When the insulin failed to kill him, the women attempted to smother Alessandro with a pillow. He continued to resist until around 11pm, when they finally strangled him to death using his own bootlaces.
Dismemberment and Cover-Up
In her confession, Lorena provided horrifying details of how she dismembered her son’s body alone. “I took care of Alessandro’s ‘dismemberment’ myself,” she told the judge. “I used a hacksaw and a sheet to hold the blood and I dissected him into three pieces. There were no blood splatters – that’s why the Carabinieri police found everything in order.”
Mailyn helped move the body parts to the garage and covered them with quicklime. The women planned to let time consume the remains before scattering them in the mountains, “as Alessandro had always desired,” according to Lorena.
For five days, Lorena continued going to work at the hospital while Mailyn stayed home with the baby. But the psychological strain proved too much for the younger woman, who broke down and called police on 31 July.
A Town in Shock
The quiet town of Gemona del Friuli, home to around 11,000 people, has been left reeling by the brutal crime. Mayor Roberto Revelant described it as unprecedented in the community’s history.
“Nothing like this has ever happened here before,” Revelant said. “It’s a terrible thing, it’s heart-wrenching. It is a very serious and heart-breaking event.”
The mayor confirmed that Alessandro often worked abroad and had dreamed of moving to Colombia, where Mailyn is from. The couple’s six-month-old daughter has been placed in the care of social services.
“The whole community is rallying around the baby,” Revelant added. “We are taking care of her, through social services, with the utmost care, to ensure her safety and a dignified future.”
Legal Proceedings
Lorena Venier has been charged with premeditated murder and concealing a body. She is being held at the Coroneo women’s prison in Trieste under suicide watch. Her lawyer, Giovanni De Nardo, has announced plans to request a psychiatric evaluation for his client.
“As you can imagine, she was visibly shocked by the cruelty of her action and by the fact that her gesture violated any natural law,” De Nardo said, confirming his client had made a “full confession” to prosecutors.
Mailyn Castro Monsalvo faces charges of instigation to murder for allegedly encouraging her mother-in-law to kill Alessandro. Prosecutors claim she solicited Lorena to commit the murder. She has been placed in a women’s facility on the island of Giudecca in Venice.
During initial questioning, Mailyn exercised her right to remain silent and appeared to be in a confused state. Police noted bruises on her body consistent with a physical altercation, which investigators believe occurred when Lorena tried to prevent her from calling emergency services.
A History of Dysfunction
Neighbours and acquaintances painted a picture of a troubled family dynamic. Alessandro was raised by his mother alone after his Egyptian father abandoned them when he was young. He had no steady employment and survived on odd jobs, including some work abroad.
According to initial investigations, Alessandro had a criminal conviction for serious assault that was becoming enforceable, which would have prevented him from leaving the country – adding urgency to his plans to depart for Colombia.
The family’s financial situation was precarious, with Lorena’s nursing salary supporting all four members of the household. This economic pressure, combined with Alessandro’s alleged violent behaviour and drug and alcohol problems, created a toxic environment that ultimately exploded into violence.
International Implications
The case has drawn attention to the issue of domestic violence and the extreme measures some victims feel compelled to take. Criminologist David Wilson noted the rarity of such crimes, saying: “In Western countries, only 10 per cent of people who kill are female. This case is a filicide, meaning a parent who kills a child, which is unusual. Among those cases, it is mostly parents killing young children. Killing a grown-up child is even more unusual.”
The brutal nature of the crime has sparked discussions about Italy’s “mammoni” culture – where adult sons often remain dependent on their mothers well into adulthood. The case represents a shocking inversion of this typically protective relationship.
Post-mortem examination results are expected in the coming days, which may provide additional evidence about the exact cause of death and corroborate the women’s account of events.
As the legal proceedings continue, the small community of Gemona del Friuli struggles to comprehend how a respected nurse and devoted grandmother could commit such an unthinkable act, even in the name of protecting those she loved.
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