AUSSIE EXEC ALLEGEDLY KIDNAPPED TWICE IN ONE DAY IN SICILY
A Melbourne executive alleged she was kidnapped twice in Sicily within hours by separate men.
Stephanie, 36, said the alleged incidents happened in October 2025, when she was in the Lo Stagnone area near Marsala, drawn there partly by kiteboarding, the New York Post reported. She had travelled to Europe with friends and stayed on in Italy after they left.
She joined a social gathering with kiteboarders, and the group planned to move on to another bar. Stephanie accepted a ride from a European expat she had met in the group, believing he was heading to the next venue too, News18 reported.
Shortly after they set off, the driver told her, “let’s see if we can get this car to 160,” Stephanie told news.com.au.
The ride and the gate
Stephanie said the driver sped up on small Sicilian roads even after she pleaded with him to stop. “No, please don’t. I want to get out,” she said she told him.
She texted her location to her kiteboarding instructor from the car.
After about 12 kilometres, the car pulled into a gated compound, Stephanie said. She found the door unlocked, got out and ran until she found somewhere to hide, then checked whether anyone was following her.
She then walked a couple of kilometres until she spotted a security guard’s car with its warning lights on in a quiet town. Using a translation app, she explained what had happened, and the guard agreed to drive her to her accommodation. He called his boss to explain the trip, she said.
Stephanie said the guard then stopped in an alley and typed a message on her phone. It read: “What are you going to do for me for driving you home?”
She said she bolted from the car into a vineyard. She kept heading toward her hotel on foot and hid when headlights appeared.
She also stopped at vending machines to buy drinks, she said, so the transactions could potentially help trace her movements.
What happened next
Stephanie made it back to her accommodation and said she “cried all the next day.” When she later met up with the kiteboarding group, they were “beside themselves” after hearing what happened, the Post reported.
She stressed that the first man was a European expat. “It’s absolutely not an Italian thing,” she said.
Stephanie shares DIY home-renovation videos on Instagram under the name stephadiy and had been interested in Italy’s one-euro house schemes, in which abandoned or dilapidated properties are sold for a symbolic price. Those plans are now on hold.
“I don’t think I’ll be going to Italy to work on a project unless I have someone that I’m doing it with now,” she said.
On July 11, 2026, Sicilian outlet TP24 said the accounts relied solely on Stephanie’s testimony and that it found no reported complaint, investigation or official confirmation from Italian authorities.
