report the following article appeared today on the website of "The Arena " newspaper of Verona:
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Verona. More than eight years after the case came to Mayor Flavio Tosi the final sentence to two months jail for racist propaganda against
Gypsies . There's no legal foothold even to the other five members of the League final on trial in 2004: Mr Matthew Bragantini , vice president of the province Luke Cole, the city council and the mayor's sister, Barbara Tosi , the City Councillor Henry Cors ie the writing Maurizio Filippi since yesterday have saddled her conviction for the same offense of first citizen. In fact, the defendants do not have to serve even one day in jail because the sentence was suspended as well as additional punishment that a ban to take part in election campaigns for three years.
I met the plaintiffs, the seven Sinti and Travellers National Opera, assisted by Professor Lorenzo Picotti and lawyers Federica Panizzi, Paola Varela Malavolta and Henry. Already in August two years ago, the injured parties had collected 50 thousand euro in damages, paid by members of the Northern League. In light of this ruling, will not return even one euro in Tosi and the other defendants.
What's more, all members of the Northern League will have to pay legal fees of defendants in a civil action. Now we have to wait several weeks to know the reason for the Court of Cassation confirmed the sentence already imposed by three different judicial bodies: before the tribunal in Verona in December 2004 for incitement and propaganda of racist views, then the Court of Appeal Venice in two different sentences. The first was decided on 30 January 2007 but was later annulled by the Supreme court on December 13 of that year.
On 20 October 2008, however, always the appeal court confirmed a sentence of two months only for promotion of racist ideas. Against this decision the defenders of Tosi and the other 5 defendants, lawyers and Giovanni Paolo Tebaldi Maccagnani and Professor Piero Longo Padua, appealed to the Supreme Court. And the Court of last resort, decided last night with a sentence that puts a tombstone on this process, which lasted nearly five years.
INQUIRY . The mayor and five other members of the League came under investigation in 2001 for launching a political campaign against the squatter camps of gypsies the territory of our municipality. In the opinion of the judges at the various stages of appeal, however, that campaign had all the characteristics to be based on racist ideals. The Northern League, in practice, is not limited to the closure of the squatter camps of the syntax between the city and surrounding area but asked the indiscriminate removal of all gypsies. And he had a massive political campaign, disseminating not only the city but also the province of posters and leaflets as well as numerous statements of the mayor released to the newspapers and never denied.
Among the slogans of those posters, was to "send away Gypsies ',' immediate evacuation of the camps of the nomads . Tosi then declared Sept. 16 that the gypsies' ... send their children to steal ... there should not be here because they do not integrate ... . Defenders, however, have never had any doubts about legality of statements Tosi: "Posters and statements were evaluated together with the petition had been declared legitimate by the courts of appeal. I do not understand why the judges of the Supreme Court failed to assess these two elements together, "said lawyer Paul last night Tebaldi.
THE KNOT OF PROCESS . The courts of appeal January 30, 2007 were only partially confirmed the sentence of six months imposed at first instance, by reducing the sentence to two months. The charge of incitement Racial hatred was gone by the appellate ruling and was left with the propaganda of ideas discriminatory.
The petition with the request to close the squatter camps of the syntax to send to the municipal administration, therefore, was not legitimized as had been the political campaigning. And the Supreme Court had noted in its order for reference is an inconsistency to be remedied. A question immediately resolved by the appeals court last October 20. "The petition was a legitimate tool," explained Professor Lorenzo Picotti that protect the Sinti, "while in the crosshairs of the courts is over the political campaign that had a clear racist."
Giampaolo Chavan
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Photo taken from www.blablog.it
posts from www.fratellipolemici.blogspot.com
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