'Troubling' topless sunbather sparks Italian debate

London, Aug 12 (ANI): A woman in Italy has sparked a debate after she reported a topless sunbathing woman to cops saying that the way she applied suntan lotion 'troubled' her sons.

The 26-year-old woman, identified only as Luisa under Italian privacy laws, was sunbathing on a public beach at Anzio south of Rome.

The mother asked the woman, who is an assistant in a fashion store, to cover up her ample breasts and to stop rubbing cream on her body as it troubled her sons aged 14 and 12.

But the topless woman refused, and the mother went and called the police.

"A patrol was stopped by a mother of two sons who was angry at a topless sunbather and the way she was applying suntan cream," the Telegraph quoted a police spokesman in Anzio as saying.

"She told us that she had asked the woman to cover herself up because her young sons aged 12 and 14, had been admiring the sunbather and they had been troubled by what she was doing.

"The patrol went and took her details and she argued, still topless, that she could so no harm in what she was doing as it was a public beach.

"We have opened a file on committing an obscene act as we are committed to following the complaint. From what I heard she was very attractive," the police spokesman stated.

The action of the mother has caused a debate on topless sunbathing to start.

"Something like this happening in 2010 is absurd. My client was approached and asked to cover up by the woman and she simply asked her what her problem was," Rome based lawyer, Gianluca Arrighi, said.

"The fact a file has been opened is compulsory following the complaint but I can't imagine any judge in 2010 convicting a woman for sunbathing topless.

"Let's be clear my client is tall, brunette and has an ample breast and is therefore going to naturally be sensuous when she applies cream to her chest.

"This may well have attracted the attention of the women's two sons but it should not lead to my client being convicted. She is amazed that she is being condemned for simply sunbathing topless.

"It was a public beach and she could see no harm in what she was doing," he stated.

Arrighi also said that it was not illegal to sunbathe topless on a public beach, unless there is a local bylaw.

Topless sunbathing has dropped out of fashion in recent years. In both France and Italy far fewer people abandon their bikini tops when on the beach.

"You do see far fewer topless sunbathers these days than you used to but I think that's because the beach is no longer the place where you go to get a tan," Countess Barbara Ronchi della Rocca, an Italian etiquette expert, said.

"Nowadays people arrive bronzed already having spent the winter in tanning salons and they spend their time at the beach bar semi clothed and socialising instead," she added. (ANI)