Rajmonda Kotorri was 16 years old and still attending school the last time her family saw her. It was 1999 and she went to a school near Gramsh, an Albanian town of about 20,000 people. She was the sixth of seven children, three girls and four boys.
Laureta Kotorri, Rajmonda's younger sister, told Fanpage.it that shortly after her daughter's disappearance, the family learned of Rajmonda's alleged affair with a man 15 years her senior, also Albanian. It is learned that he moved to Italy in 1999 and it was speculated that the girl had gone with him. It is not clear whether this happened by force, choice or the promise of a better life.
A short time later, a phone call between Rajmonda and her family in June 2001 confirmed their suspicions. The girl was living in Italy with this man, who was then in his 30s. During the call, Rajmonda said that she worked as a bartender in a Milanese restaurant and wanted to stay in Italy long enough to save money. That was the last time the family heard from her. Since then, there has been nothing, or almost nothing.
Meanwhile, Rajmonda's sisters mobilized to search for their daughter. They initially contacted the Gramsh police, reporting her missing, and then contacted Interpol and the Italian police.
In 2003, through contact with an Italian police officer, the family learned of another reality: Raimonda was a prostitute and the man she was seeing was actually a pimp. That same year, a woman who introduced herself as Raimonda's roommate, who lived in Lodi, reported the girl missing, telling police that Raimonda had not been seen since a night out with a client.
Since 2003, her phone has never rang again, nor has there been any reliable news about her. A report, received by the family in 2006, said that Raymonda had been seen in Rome, but there has never been any confirmation.
"My family and I have never lost hope of finding Raymond. She is free to live her life, it is enough for us to know that she is alive. And if that is not the case, we will accept any scenario. But we want to know what happened to her. If she is dead, we want a grave to cry over," her sister Laureta told Fanpage.it.
Even 25 years after their last contact with Raymond, the family has launched an appeal again through "Penelope Lombardia", an association that supports relatives of missing persons, in the hope of reaching someone who may have some kind of information, however small.
"Someone must have seen and met him all these years. Someone must know something. We are convinced," Laureta concluded. ©LAPSI.al
