Rome, Italy (AFP) — An Italian prosecutor requested a life sentence Monday for a university student who admitted to killing his ex-girlfriend in a high-profile case that sparked nationwide outrage and debate over femicide.

Prosecutor Andrea Petroni told a Venice court that Filippo Turetta, 22, had acted with “particular brutality” in stabbing Giulia Cecchettin to death and leaving her body in a ravine in November 2023, local news agencies reported.

The request for a life sentence came on the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, an event marked by a protest of more than 100,000 people in Rome on Saturday, many of them marching in Cecchettin’s name.

Turetta — who was in court Monday — has admitted to stabbing Cecchettin, a 22-year-old biomedical engineering student at the University of Padua, after she sought to break off their relationship.

Petroni told the court that Turetta’s relationship with Cecchettin was based on “strong pressure” and “control” over his ex-girlfriend. He asked the court to impose aggravating circumstances of acting with cruelty and premeditation.

A verdict is expected on December 3.

At the trial’s opening, Turetta’s lawyer Giovanni Caruso warned the court against a “media trial” and said his client “must not become the face of a cultural battle against gender violence”.

Cecchettin, who was due to graduate just days after her death, was reported missing on November 11 after accompanying Turetta to a shopping centre and never returning home.

Police launched a week-long manhunt after video surveillance footage captured Turetta attacking her violently before fleeing with her in his car.

Her body was found on November 18 in a gully near Lake Barcis, about 120 kilometres (75 miles) north of Venice. She had been stabbed at least 75 times, the prosecutor said.

Turetta was arrested a day later on the side of the road near Leipzig in Germany, after his car ran out of petrol.

The case triggered outrage and soul-searching in Italy, a majority-Catholic country where traditional gender roles still hold sway and where sexist behaviour by men is often downplayed.

Last week, Italy’s education minister Giuseppe Valditara sparked controversy by claiming that “male domination no longer exists” and blaming violence against women on immigrants.

In another femicide trial, a court in Milan on Monday sentenced another man, Alessandro Impagnatiello, to life in prison for the murder of his pregnant fiancee Giulia Tramontano in May 2023.