There is outrage in Italy after a judge cleared a school caretaker of groping a student because he only groped her for 10 seconds.
The 17-year-old at the centre of the case was groped by the 66-year-old man while at high school in Rome.
She described walking up the staircase to class with a friend, when she felt her trousers fall down, a hand touching her buttocks and grabbing her underwear, BBC reported.
"Love, you know I was joking," the caretaker reportedly told her when she turned around.
The man admitted to groping the student without consent but said it was a joke.
"Well, it was no joke to me," the student told BBC.
According to the BBC, the caretaker came up to her from behind without saying anything.
"He put his hands down my trousers and inside my underwear," she said."He groped my bottom, then he pulled me - hurting my private parts."
A public prosecutor in Rome asked for a three-and-a-half-year prison sentence but this week the caretaker was acquitted of sexual assault charges.
According to the judges, what happened "does not constitute a crime" as it lasted "just 10 seconds."
Since the ruling, teenagers in Rome have expressed outrage on social media, with many using TikTok to express how they feel.
The young girl has since told BBC, she feels betrayed by her school and by the justice system.
