A jealous ex-boyfriend who allegedly burned his pretty 17-year-old girlfriend after she broke up with him is set to go on trial for her murder in Sicily after her charred corpse was found by a cliff.

Pietro Morreale, 19, will stand trial for the murder of Roberta Siragusa, a 17-year-old student, at the Palermo Court of Assizes on 1st March 2022.

The gruesome murder took place in Caccamo, which is a town near the Sicilian capital Palermo in southern Italy, on 24th January 2021, and the victim’s charred body was found near a cliff at the Monte San Calogero mountain, also in Sicily.

It is alleged that the defendant argued with the victim and killed her with a blow to the head before dousing her lifeless body with petrol and setting it on fire after the pair left together in a car after an evening spent with some friends.

An autopsy of the girl’s corpse revealed that she had suffered a serious injury to her head as well as the burns to her body.

Public prosecutor Ambrogio Cartosio and his deputy Giacomo Barbara have charged Morreale with murder and concealing a body.

The teen’s parents, Iana Brancato and Filippo Siragusa, along with her brother, who has been named as Dario Siragusa, filed a civil action at a preliminary hearing.

The young man, who suffered a burn to his hand in the incident, denies the accusations, despite having told the police where to find Roberta’s body, and claims that she doused herself in petrol before setting herself on fire.

Investigators do not believe his version of events and argue instead that he murdered her. CCTV footage from the nearby Caccamo sports field allegedly shows that the teenage girl was first killed and then set on fire.

A car belonging to the defendant is said to have remained stationary while the teenage girl’s body burned.

The victim’s mother, Iana Brancato, said: “We’re surviving but we’re not living without her.”