Five men are reported to have been arrested on suspicion of drugging and gang-raping a British woman while they were employed as staff at a hotel in southern Italy.
The holidaymaker and her daughter were staying at a hotel in Meta di Sorrento, a popular destination south of Naples.
On the last night of their stay in October 2016 they were allegedly given drugged drinks by two barmen at the hotel.
The men took the mother to a nearby swimming pool and sexually assaulted her, investigators said.
The woman in her fifties was then said to have been handed over to another hotel employee, who took her to a bedroom used by staff, where at least ten men were waiting. The group allegedly raped her and photographed her on their phones, The Times reported.
On her return to the UK, the woman reported the incident to the police, who took biological samples and found bruises all over her body.
Five suspects were arrested by police in a series of dawn raids yesterday. All are current or former workers at the hotel, which was named by a police source as the four-star Mar Hotel Alimuri.
After the arrests, Italian magistrate Alessandro Pennasilico said that collaboration between Italian investigators and Kent police meant “ample and undeniable” evidence was supplied to back up the British tourist’s allegations.
Police said that DNA samples taken from the victim’s body matched hotel staff, while the woman identified one of her assailants from a tattoo of a crown he had on his neck.
Urine and hair analysis confirmed that she had been given a drug at the time of the alleged assault.
Italian police were informed and seized phones belonging to hotel employees, discovering that some had created a social media chat group called “Bad Habits” in which they swapped photos taken of the woman during the assault.
The suspects, all Italian men, were named as Antonino Miniero, Davide Gennaro Gargiulo, Fabio De Virgilio, Raffaele Regio and Ciro Francesco D’Antonio.
The hotel did not respond to requests for comment, according to The Times.