The CDM has approved the bill by the Minister of Justice, Carlo Nordio, which makes all crimes prosecutable ex officio, in cases where the aggravating circumstance for the mafia and terrorism applies. “In a week opened by the historic arrest of the most dangerous mafia still on the run, the government proposes to Parliament, with an urgent procedure, to raise the level of combating the most dangerous crime”, writes Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni on Twitter. “With the bill approved by the CDM – he adds – all crimes aggravated by mafia purposes or methods can be prosecuted ex officio and not on the complaint. Furthermore, for crimes that allow arrest in flagrante delicto, there are 48 hours for the presentation of the lawsuit without the arrested person returning to free
After the alarm from the judiciary on the risk of release from prison and impunity for a series of crimes which have become or were already prosecutable on a complaint, the government is taking measures with a bill. A “surgical and targeted” intervention, as defined by Nordio in the Chamber, not only on the Cartabia reform, whose overall direction the minister appreciates but on all the previous rules which over time have made some crimes prosecutable only upon the denunciation of the victim, even in the presence of the mafia and terrorist aggravating circumstance. About sixty in all, of which 7 introduced by the last reform.
The need to intervene had arisen in particular after a case that had caused a sensation: during a trial in Palermo, the prosecutor’s office had been forced to ask for the release of three accused of injuries aggravated by the mafia method due to lack of a lawsuit. None had been released from prison as convicted of other crimes. But in the wake of that affair, the prosecutors and the National Association of Magistrates had called for “a rapid rethinking of the choices of the legislator”.
Other news stories had also caused discussion, such as those responsible for several car thefts in Veneto who had been released from prison for lack of a lawsuit. The measures adopted by the government intend to remedy these “critical issues precisely”, as explained by the Minister of Justice, announcing the intervention.
So as far as the mafia and terrorism are concerned, with the ex officio prosecution for all crimes in which this aggravating circumstance occurs, the intention is to protect the freedom of determination of the victim, who out of fear could give up reporting those responsible for the crime. With the intervention on the arrest in flagrante delicto punishable by lawsuit, it will happen, for example in the case of the theft of a vehicle with violence against things, that it will be possible to proceed with the arrest of the offender in flagrante delicto, even if it is not possible to immediately find the victim. Naturally, the arrest will expire after 48 hours, if the lawsuit has not been acquired.
Above all, the Lega and FDI had pushed for an intervention. “The Meloni government, by intervening in a timely and prudent manner, thus confirms its commitment to the fight against organized crime, in line with what we said during the electoral campaign and that is, the fight without respite against all the mafias”, declared the group leader of Brothers of Italy in the Senate, Lucio Malan. And the Undersecretary of Justice, Andrea Ostellari (Lega), spoke of a “promise kept”.
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