Manslaughter against unknown persons. This is the hypothesis followed by the Udine prosecutor’s office investigating the tragedy of the three boys swallowed by the flood of the Natisone river on May 31st. On June 2, the water returned the bodies of Patrizia Cormos, 20 years old, and Bianca Doros, 23 years old, while Cristian Casian Molnar, 25 years old, is still missing. The searches continue, but it is also time for investigations to reconstruct exactly what happened and ascertain whether the tragedy could have been avoided.
“We have opened an investigation for manslaughter against unknown persons: in these events, to proceed we need to have responsibilities of omission, not of commission”, says the prosecutor of Udine, Massimo Lia. In the background there is the pain of the three families, with Patrizia’s mother repeating endlessly: “They had to save her, not make videos”.
The last hug of Patrizia, Bianca and Cristian
There are certain facts in the story. On Friday 31 May Patrizia takes an exam at the Academy of Fine Arts and afterwards the three twenty-year-olds decide to go for a walk. They arrive at “Premariacco beach”, they take a small road that takes them to the river. In a few minutes the weather changes and they find themselves on a strip of land that is quickly covered by water, which rises in level very quickly. The alarm is raised and the firefighters arrive. They approach with a crane and throw them a rope to save them, but they are unable to secure them. The three boys, who in the meantime have embraced each other, are dragged away by the current. There is also a video of these terrible moments, shot by a passer-by who witnessed the attempt to rescue the boys.
A “tsunami” in a few hours: what happened to the Natisone river
SOS launched 4 times: “Call my mother”
Taking stock of the investigations today, June 4, is the Udine prosecutor, Massimo Lia. “In nature, tragic fatality also exists. After this necessary premise, we are carrying out all the checks that need to be done. Everything will be verified, acquired and examined. Both the speech of the helicopter used for the rescue and the warning signs of the bathing ban and the danger of drowning, and above all the timing from the first alarm to the arrival of the rescuers”.
A point to ascertain, as mentioned by the prosecutor, is the presence or absence of signs signaling the danger. The Natisone is defined as an extreme torrential watercourse: sudden and unexpected floods, like that of May 31st. Along its course there are signs prohibiting swimming and indicating the danger of drowning. However, there would be no signage on the risk of “flash floods”. And again, was the help too late? Did the fire brigade helicopter leave from a base too far away? Were the intervention protocols respected? “We will conduct all the necessary investigations to ascertain whether the assistance was timely – specifies the prosecutor -. I would, however, like to point out that, at present, there are no specific elements that make us go in this direction, but the checks are at an early stage”.
“Patrizia made four phone calls to the single emergency number 112, the last of which went unanswered – Lia clarifies – The first call was made at 1.29pm, the others in the minutes immediately following. From the first investigations, everything took place over a period of time. storm that can be roughly quantified in half an hour. From a situation of apparent tranquility, that tumultuous flow of the Natisone river overwhelmed them”.
Patrizia’s mother “Instead of making videos they had to save her”
“What pains me most is that everyone took photos and videos” but no one moved “to save them. No one. Maybe they could have saved them. It wasn’t important to take the videos. She had gone for a walk, she called the 112. Left his name, address said ‘Call my mom’.” To vent all her pain to Veneto Messenger she is Patrizia Cormos’ mother. In the woman’s mind is her last conversation with her daughter: “After the exam at the Academy, taken on Friday morning, she called me and told me ‘I did very well, I knew everything'”.
Patrizia and Bianca dressed as weddings for the farewell
The prosecutor’s office did not order an autopsy on the bodies of Patrizia and Bianca. “The investigations on the bodies, the dynamics of the facts, the documentation that we have all seen and the external examination carried out by the medical examiner on the bodies, allow, with reasonable certainty, to identify the cause of death as asphyxia from drowning and various traumas. Therefore, the external cadaveric inspection was considered sufficient, also to return the girls to their families, to proceed with the funeral rite”, explains Lia.
The funeral chamber was therefore opened in the Mansutti Funeral Home in the urban cemetery of San Vito, in Udine. The two girls were dressed as brides, as per the tradition of their country of origin: Romania. A moment of prayer will be celebrated by two priests, one Orthodox and one Catholic, to symbolize the union of different faiths in prayer.
