The Italian Supreme Court has ruled that public masturbation is not a crime – even if it is done so with the aim of being seen by others.
Advertisement
Pierto L will now be fined between €5,000 and €30,000 when he appears again in a Catania courtroom. However, despite the fact that public cannolo caressing is no longer a crime in Italy, it is still punishable by a fine – of between five and thirty thousand.
The decision came down from the Italian Supreme Court – La Corte di Cassazione – in the case of a 69-year-old man, identified only as “PL”, who was caught masturbating in Catania, a city on Sicily’s east coast.
The case arose after sexagenerian Pietro L was nabbed “pulling his member” and practising “autoeroticism” in front of female students at the University of Catania last May, according to local reports.
In taking their decision, the supreme court judges noted the fact that the Italian parliament passed a law past year decriminalising the offence of lurking in places frequented by girls in order to be seen masturbating.
His initial indecent behaviour sentence for taking out his penis and engaging in “auto-eroticism” was a three-month jail sentence and a €3,420 fine, which was upheld initially by the Court of Appeal in Catania. Judges ruled that public masturbation out of the presence of minors is no longer deemed criminal conduct due to a change in the law a year ago, which decriminalized the act.
In light of this ruling, the court overturned “PL’s” sentence.
Advertisement
In the United Kingdom, the sentence for public masturbation is around 14 days in prison.
