Mum-of-three found 'murdered' with chilling three-word note left next to body

A mum-of-three was found dead with a chilling note left next to her body.

Assunta Sgarbini, known as Tina, was discovered in her flat in Montecorvino Rovella, Italy, on Saturday morning - thought to have been strangled. The note next to her body read: "I messed up." Her ex-partner, Christian Persico, became the prime suspect after his parents contacted police.

A manhunt was launched, and the same evening Persico, 36, was arrested after a passer-by recognised him in a nearby street. He was found with scratches on his face, thought to be from 47-year-old Tina’s desperate attempts to fight him off.

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One friend paid tribute: “You fought with all your strength to beat your illness, and yet a murderous hand has taken you away. I love you, Tina – you leave an enormous void.”

He refused to answer questions during interrogation, exercising his right to remain silent, and was held on remand. A post-mortem ruled Tina’s cause of death as external mechanical asphyxia. Investigators believe she was strangled, but the exact method is still under investigation.

The couple had been together since 2016 and were reportedly seen in a bar just days before the killing. But Tina’s father, Antonio, said she had thrown Persico out.

“She threw him out, in my view, because he didn’t work,” he told local media. "He would just turn up at the house and do whatever he wanted.

“At a certain point my daughter told him, ‘You have to leave,’ and she kicked him out. Sadly, you can’t keep someone in the house who doesn’t contribute.”

Tina’s three children, from a previous relationship, were not at the flat when the horror unfolded. The motive is still under investigation.

Earlier this year a boy died of mechanical asphyxia after his 24-stone foster mum sat on his head and neck until he stopped moving. Jennifer Lee Wilson was jailed after being charged with reckless homicide over the death of Dakota Levi Stevens in Berrien County, Michigan, on April 25, 2024.

The 48-year-old told police Dakota had run off earlier in the day before she found him at a neighbour’s house. She claimed the youngster began misbehaving when they returned to her home in Valparaiso.

Her account was that he had thrown himself on the ground outside and so Wilson sat on the boy as a punishment. She put pressure on his head and neck, while on the phone with his case worker, and he was reportedly screaming at this point.

An autopsy found Dakota had suffered catastrophic injuries, including organ and soft tissue damage and liver and lung haemorrhaging, while the cause of death was mechanical asphyxia. The coroner’s office, which concluded the causes behind Dakota’s death in April last year, declared the incident as homicide.