Cecchettin was a 22-year-old student who was murdered by her ex-boyfriend, Filippo Turetta, in November 2023.

On Wednesday, the judges who sentenced Turetta to life in prison in December released the reasons for their decision, including why they excluded “cruelty” as an aggravating factor.

They said the reason he stabbed her so many times was a result of the killer’s “inexperience and inability” and was not down to cruelty.

Cecchettin’s murder shocked Italy, and it was hoped that the case would force the country to face up to its problem with gender-based violence.

But a long series of femicides has continued here since Cecchettin was killed, including the recent shocking murders of two students in Rome and Messina.

“A sentence like this, with the reasons given at a moment in history like the one we are going through, is not only dangerous, but also a terrible precedent,” said Elena Cecchettin in an Instagram post.

“If we do not begin to take this issue seriously, everything that was said about [the femicide of] Giulia being the last one are just words in the wind.”

Turetta admitted to stabbing Cecchettin to death at Fossò, near Venice, on November 11, 2023, days before she was due to graduate from Padua University in biomedical engineering.

Cecchettin was reported missing on the day she was murdered after she met up with Turetta and went for a meal with him.

Her body was found in a gully at Val Caltea, near Lake Barcis in Friuli, on November 18, 2023.

Turetta, who was doing the same course as Cecchettin, went on the run after dumping the corpse.

He was tracked down to the side of a road near Leipzig, Germany, after he ran out of money and his car ran out of petrol, a week after the murder.

ANSA