Priest arrested having sex with minors

ITALY
Vanguard

Rome, Italy – A priest, a junior football coach and an HIV-positive man were among 11 people arrested in northern Italy on charges of paying for sex with minors, police said Thursday.

The arrests in the Lombardy and Emilia-Romagna regions follow a six-month investigation led by detectives in Brescia into a prostitution network which used social media to put the minors in contact with potential clients.

The investigation was triggered after a mother found suspicious text messages on the phone of her 16-year-old daughter.

The accused priest was named by his diocese as Diego Rota, 45, a parish priest in the village of Solza near the city of Bergamo.

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