Statewatch News Online: Italy: Genoa: G8 appeals: longer prison terms for demonstrators, more officers convicted (1)
28 March 2012
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Italy, Genoa
G8 appeals:
longer prison terms for demonstrators, more officers convicted
On 5 March 2010,
Genoa appeal court found that 44 people including police officers,
carabinieri officials, prison officers and medical staff deployed
in the make-shift detention facility in Bolzaneto army barracks
during the G8 summit in July 2001 in Genoa were guilty of abuses
suffered by demonstrators arrested in the streets and subsequently
held on the premises, overturning the acquittal of 29 of them
in the first trial.
252 people from several
countries passed through Bolzaneto barracks, 197 of them arrested
and 55 held temporarily, many of whom testified willingly in
the first trial, reporting an array of violent, demeaning and
insulting practices to which they were subjected (see Statewatch
vol. 18 no. 4). 15 officers were convicted in the first trial,
and the highest sentences passed were of five years (one), three
years and two months (one) and two years and four months (two),
and the ten sentences for convictions entailing custodial sentences
of a year or less were suspended.
The trial ascertained that acts falling within the "degrading
and inhuman treatment" category was meted out to the demonstrators,
but the absence of the criminal offence of torture in the Italian
penal code in spite of a 20-year-old international commitment
by Italy to introduce it as a signatory of the Convention against
Torture and its Optional Protocols resulted in lower sentences
and the applicability of the statute of limitations. Hence, the
offences for which they were convicted included "misuse
of office", "misuse of authority" and "private
violence". The guilty verdicts on appeal will not result
in custodial sentences being executed as a result of the proceedings
running beyond the statute of limitations, because the events
in questions occurred nearly nine years ago.
Thus, there were seven effective convictions, with sentences
suspended: the longest (three years and two months) for police
assistant chief MLP for spreading a detainee's fingers, damaging
their ligaments; two years and two months for a doctor, SS; and
one year for two prison police officers, MM and MCS, and for
three police officers, MA, PU and MT. The offences included entering
false information in official records -an offence that is not
subject to the statute of limitations-, and in three cases, a
police officer, a prison guard and a doctor chose not to avail
themselves of the statute of limitations, confiding that their
first instance acquittals would have been upheld. While those
found guilty on appeal after their earlier acquittal complained
that they were placed "in the same cauldron without taking
individual positions into account, that were very different and
identifiable", and were convicted collectively for other
people's behaviour, the plaintiffs' lawyers and human rights
organisations including Amnesty International were pleased that
"justice was done" and asked for the culprits to be
suspended from their duties, while they lamented Italy's failure
to introduce the criminal offence of torture. AI also warned
that "systemic failures which contributed to the violations
in Bolzaneto have not been addressed by the Italian authorities".
On 8 October 2009, the Genoa appeal court had also ruled on the
street violence by demonstrators, issuing a sentence that was
significant because it overturned a number of guilty verdicts,
others were neutralised by the statute of limitations, and the
number of people convicted fell from 24 to 10, while it increased
the length of the prison terms that they are set to face. In
practice, those responsible for vandalism and violence against
offices, shops and property were found guilty of the very serious
charge of "destruction and looting", whereas some demonstrators
involved in clashes in the streets with the police and carabinieri
after an unlawful charge by a unit of the latter force in the
context of the demonstrations were acquitted. Charges of destruction
and looting, intended for revolts or insurrections and entailing
extremely long prison sentences, have only started being used
for violence at political demonstrations in recent times.
The 10 demonstrators whose
convictions on these charges were confirmed were also given longer
custodial sentences to serve: FP, from 10 years and six months
to 15 years; VV, from 10 years and six months to 13 years; MC,
from 11 years to 12 years and three months; AF, from nine to
10 years; CA, from seven years and six months to eight years;
LF, from 10 years to 10 years and nine months; AV, from seven
years and eight months to eight years; CC, from seven years and
10 months to eight years; DU, from six years and six months to
seven years; and IM, from six years to six years and six months.
Haidi Giuliani, the mother of Carlo, the youth killed in the
clashes on the streets in Genoa in 2001, commented that "this
is not a sentence, it is revenge".
Thus, violence by protestors against objects and establishments
has incurred lengthy custodial sentences, responsibility for
violence in street clashes has been mitigated by police forces'
responsibility in provoking them through undue aggression, and
responsibility for physical violence and psychological abuse
against demonstrators who were in custody has been attributed
to a larger number of those operating in Bolzaneto than in the
first trial, albeit with lower custodial sentences that will
not be executed. The statute of limitations has intervened to
effectively strike off many of the convictions, for both officers
and demonstrators, although more so in the case of the former
due to the charges of destruction and looting (devastazione e
saccheggio). The appeal ruling concerning events in Bolzaneto
will also result in responsibility for paying damages to the
victims of abuses by the interior, justice and defence ministries.
Sources:
Appeal court judgment (full-text) (14MP, link)
Repubblica, 5.3.2010; Corriere della Sera, 5.3.2010; Il Megafono
Quotidiano, 5.3.2010; ANSA 9.10.2009; Amnesty International,
8.3.2010. Ongoing coverage from Osservatorio
sulla repressione
Previous Statewatch coverage:
Italy:
Making sense of the G8 trials and aftermath, Statewatch,
vol. 18 no. 4, 2008.
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