He beats his son with a wooden spoon and the video ends up on TikTok. It happened in Catania, where a 59-year-old man was arrested for family abuse after being identified by the police. In the video you see the man repeatedly and violently hitting his son with a large wooden spoon who tells him he wants to “be with his mother” while shouting at him “Who am I? I am your master and you must do what I tell you…”. The child’s cries of pain and desperation are heartbreaking as he cries profusely and says several times “you are my father, my master…” and begs him “stop, please…”. But the man continues to hit him and insult him and when he returns to beg him “I’m feeling bad, please stop…”, he continues to hit him with violent slaps. The attack occurred in front of the child’s little sisters. The video, which went viral on social media, was flooded with insults.
The video posted as a kid
According to what emerged from an initial reconstruction of investigations by the flying squad of the Catania Police Headquarters coordinated by the deputy prosecutor Sebastiano Ardita and the deputy Alberto Santisi, it was the boy who posted the video of the violence that led to his father’s arrest on social media. According to this hypothesis, the attack would have been filmed with a smartphone by one of his three sisters, younger than him. The boy apparently had the video delivered and published it on a social media profile of a family member, given that he doesn’t have one of his own.
The other daughters were also mistreated
The 59-year-old is also under investigation for aggravated mistreatment of his other three younger daughters. The man is not the biological father of the victim, born from a previous relationship of the mother, but he would have adopted him and given him his own surname. The four brothers, aged between 10 and 4, were temporarily entrusted to their mother.
When the police, after identifying him, went to pick him up from his home in the historic San Cristoforo district, the neighborhood lashed out at him, insulting the man and also the children’s mother. Once secured, he was taken to the flying squad offices. The social services of the Municipality of Catania, the Court and the Prosecutor’s Office for minors of the Etna capital are also dealing with the case.
«The real beasts are men»
Harsh comment from the mayor of Catania Enrico Trantino. «Then you receive a video, but you can’t watch it for more than a few seconds (even hoping it’s staged). You wonder why we call animal species ‘beasts’, even though they protect their young.”
“I don’t judge – adds Trantino on Facebook – I don’t want to know where so much moral misery comes from, so much inhumanity, how much violence or life disruption has been suffered by those who repeatedly hit a 10-year-old child with a wooden spoon, ordering him to call him ‘master’. While someone filmed the scene and spread it on social media. The video went viral and was circulated with the caption ‘forwarded many times’. Our social services intervened immediately by contacting the Juvenile Court, which acted with the usual promptness; as well as the Prosecutor’s Office, which ordered the arrest of the ‘man’ for mistreatment. What remains are the tears and sobs of a child, violated as we fear will happen with others. That I would like him to know that there is a city that would like to look after him and tell him that this is not how the world works, but that it is love that gives smiles. And give him your hand, to accompany him towards a different tomorrow, in which those who are 10 years old should grow up with carefreeness, joy, warmth, help, and good teachers who teach them that men too are part of the animal kingdom; but sometimes they are the real ‘beasts’.”
Last updated: Sunday 4 January 2026, 2.48pm
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