MONTREAL – A Montreal businessman is on trial this week, facing serious jail time for vicious crimes against four young women.
Giovanni D’Amico is accused of punching, strangling, and in one case, almost killing, a street worker.
The alleged victim was in court in Montreal on Wednesday and for the first time in more than a decade, she came face to face with the man she says brutally attacked her.
She testified that D’Amico punched her repeatedly in the face, strangled her and forced her to have sex with him, telling the court she thought that her time had come: “I was afraid of dying,” she said.
Forty-four-year-old D’Amico is accused of similar crimes to not one, but four Montreal women, one of whom is deceased.
The first to testify said that she was working on Ontario Street in Montreal as a prostitute at the time of the alleged crimes. D’Amico allegedly picked her up and drove her to an isolated spot.
Following a dispute over money, she says that he then attacked her.
D’Amico faces up to 14 years in jail if convicted.
At the time of his arrest, D’Amico was described by police as a local businessman, but he also claimed to be a social worker of sorts – an expert in the field of prostitution.
Around the same time that he is accused of committing these brutal crimes against street workers, he appeared on a television talk show on the ‘Men TV Network’, introducing himself as someone who “studied” street workers.
D’Amico told a panel of guests that he interviewed up to a hundred prostitutes, noting that this was an area in the marketplace where women can have control over her career and make an incredible amount of money.
It’s not clear if any of the street workers he worked with are alleged victims in this rape trial, where many are wondering if he will take the stand in his own defence.
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