Roma girl hit in Turin, Salvini attacks social services. The response: “She is speculating on a tragedy”

The Order of Social Workers responds to Matteo Salvini, who had brought up the category when commenting on the case of the 2-year-old girl who died after being hit by a car while maneuvering in the parking lot of the San Giovanni Bosco hospital in Turin.

“Poor little innocent, a prayer for her. But where are the assistants and social services that should save these children from a life on the streets and of theft, without school and without joy???”, she wrote on Facebook the deputy prime minister, minister of Infrastructure and Transport, as well as secretary of the League.

Initially it seemed that the little girl, named Esmeralda, had been hit while she was begging in the parking lot with her mother, of Roma origin. However, the Councilor for Social Policies of the City of Turin, Jacopo Rosatelli, denied this reconstruction. According to the Turin daily newspaper The Pressmother and daughter had gone to the hospital to visit a hospitalized relative.

“Salvini is exploiting without knowing the facts. It is inconceivable and irresponsible to use the death of a two-year-old girl for political purposes,” replies Barbara Rosina, president of the Council of the Order. “The vice president of the Council accuses us social workers and all social services. We are close to the family of little Esmeralda and far from Minister Salvini and those who, like him, never seek solutions, but go so far as to manipulate the news to spread prejudice to the detriment of people and the profession.”

The Piedmont Region’s Councilor for Social Policies, Maurizio Marrone, of Fratelli d’Italia, also spoke out in a polemical tone on the matter: “It is unacceptable – he said – to allow nomads to drag minors with them into street begging. If the social services of the Municipality of Turin applied half the severity to the Roma with which they order the removal of minors from other families, perhaps this tragedy could have been avoided”.

Meanwhile, a photographer from Turin, Maurizio Bosio, from the Reporters agency, who works for The Presswas attacked by some relatives of the little girl.

“He had already documented the little girl’s story in the morning. When the news of the little girl’s death spread around lunchtime, Maurizio put down his camera and approached the little girl’s father with the utmost respect to offer his condolences. Unfortunately, at that moment he was attacked because he worked for La Stampa,” the Turin daily newspaper wrote. The photographer suffered a fractured nasal septum and was given a 14-day prognosis.