Milan - A Polish man living in Britain
was sentenced to more than 16 years in an Italian prison on
Monday for kidnapping a British model in Milan last July.
Chloe Ayling, 20, told Italian police she had been lured to
a photo shoot in Italy's fashion capital last summer, abducted
and held captive for six days. Her lawyer said the plot was to
sell her for sex in an online auction unless a ransom was paid.
Since returning to Britain, Ayling has given a number of
media interviews in which she said she was drugged, gagged,
bound, stuffed into a bag, put into the boot of a car and driven
to a village near Turin.
She denied suggestions that the kidnapping was a hoax after
it was reported she had gone on a shopping trip with her alleged
captor, Lukasz Pawel Herba.
Lukasz Pawel Herba sits in a Milan courtroom. Picture: Matteo Bazzi/ANSA via AP
Italian law foresees a sentence of 25 to 30 years for
kidnapping and extortion, but prosecutors asked the court in
Milan to make allowance for the short duration of the abduction
and a narcissistic personality disorder from which Herba was
said to suffer.
"Chloe was treated like something used to satisfy his evil
narcissistic needs," prosecutor Paolo Storari said in court.
Besides the prison sentence of 16 years and nine months, the
court also ordered Herba to pay an initial 60,000 euros in
damages to Ayling, who was a civil plaintiff in the trial. Final
damages will be set by a civil court.