Husband who machine-gunned his wife and daughter to death avoids life sentence in Italy after judge rules he had ‘understandably human motives’

A husband who brutally shot his wife and daughter to death with a machine gun in Italy has avoided a life sentence after a judge ruled he had “understandable human motives.”

Salvatore Montefusco, 70, shot his wife Gabriela Trandafir, 47, and their daughter, Renata, 22, in June 2022 in front of the couple’s young son.

But instead of receiving a life sentence, as requested by the Public Prosecution Service in the double femicide case, Montefusco was given only 30 years due to the “human comprehensibility of the reasons that drove the perpetrator to commit the crime.”

The Assize Court of Modena was reportedly lenient with the murderer, after explaining that he had reached the age of 70 with no criminal record and would not have committed the heinous crime “if he had not been driven by the nefarious family dynamics at play in the had been caused over time’.

The Modena Public Prosecutor’s Office had demanded life imprisonment after the brutal murder, but the judges on October 9 ruled out premeditation, despicable and futile motives, saying they had acted cruelly and considered that the assault had been part of the murder, reports Corriere di Bologna.

The sentence reveals over 200 pages how the shooting occurred after Montefusco experienced several conflicts with the two women, during which mutual complaints were made.

According to the judges, the motive behind the double murder was “the psychological state of deep discomfort, humiliation and enormous frustration experienced by the suspect.”

This was ‘due to the climate of very serious conflict that had arisen within the marital community and the concrete possibility that he himself would have to leave the parental home’.

Gabriela Trandafir, 47, right, and Renata, 22, left, were murdered by the man who received a 30-year prison sentence instead of life imprisonment

The judges reportedly found it “plausible” that when Montefusco was repeatedly told by his daughter that she was leaving the parental home, this “caused in his soul, as he himself has repeatedly underlined, that emotional and existential blackout that made him would have brought running to grab the gun’.

The firearm was reportedly only a few feet away, and in a moment of rage he grabbed it and killed both his daughter and wife.

According to the Italian report, Montefusco had previously threatened to kill the pair.

The lawyer representing the family of the two victims, Barbara Iannuccelli, was stunned by the verdict.

“The very young victim Renata Trandafir wanted to become a lawyer to defend herself against the daily violence that she and her mother had to endure,” she says.

“Today she was spared the experience of understanding why the ruthless killer of two unprotected women could benefit from such goodwill.

“General mitigating circumstances that wipe out any aggravating circumstance for… human understanding,” she said, quoting the phrase, “we are all navigating a sea of ​​stark disbelief.”