Free Republic

Three elderly Italian nuns were sexually assaulted and murdered in twin attacks in their convent in the capital of Burundi, police said today as a hunt was launched for their killers. Police initially reported that two nuns were stabbed to death yesterday afternoon. The killer then battered one of the two with a rock, before fleeing the convent. Italian authorities named the first two killed as Olga Raschietti, 83, and Lucia Pulici, 75, both Roman Catholic nuns. But in the early hours of today morning, another nun in the same convent was killed, her body beaten and head hacked off....

Three Italian nuns were found killed, two of them raped and decapitated, over the weekend in the north of Burundi's capital, officials and a priest in the African state said on Monday. Police said three suspects had been detained for questioning. A motive was not immediately clear. Father Mario Pulicini, who is responsible for the parish in a northern suburb of Bujumbura, named two of the nuns as Lucia Pulici, who was 75 and due to celebrate her birthday on Monday, and Olga Raschietti, 82. He said they were found decapitated in their dormitory on Sunday.