The ministry appeals against the reduction of 6 days of sentence, Alemanno: "It’s persistence". …

Gianni Alemanno, released from Rebibbia prison last June 24 after having served one year and 10 months in prison for trafficking in illicit influence, he shouts scandal: “Today theCarabinieriof the stationMonte Mariothey notified me of an incredible measure: the appealCassation del Ministry of Justiceagainst the order ofSupervisory Courtwhich reduced the duration of my sentence by 6 (six) days due to the inhuman conditions in which I was detained. This sentence reduction order had already been challenged byDAP(a very rare if not unique case) but this appeal had already been rejected by the Surveillance Court on 10 June. Now it’s the Ministry’s turn to even appeal to the Supreme Court to try once again to send me back to prison to serve a further 6 days.”

Overcrowding in prisons

For the former mayor of Rome, “faced with the evident disproportion of these interventions (and the related costs), compared to the concrete object of the dispute (I repeat, 6 days of detention), some questions become inevitable. The first is on the Ministry’s lack of perception of the situation ofprison overcrowdingwhich generates these measures to cut sentences by the Surveillance Courts. The second is on the personal meaning of a such persistence. Does my right-wing battle to obtain prisons that are less crazy and more functional for reducing recidivism and crime bother you? Do we want to give exemplary punishment to those who, while in prison, have reported this problem? Don’t they have anything better to do at the Ministry of Justice? To answer these questions I cannot help but renew the formal request for a conversation with Minister Nordio to illustrate to him the real situation of Italian prisons which he evidently isn’t aware of. This is from a political point of view, while from a judicial point of view it will be the Court of Cassation that will sweep away this absurd and unfounded appeal”.

The lawyer, “inconceivable situation”

“As a defender – he commented Edward AlbertarioAlemanno’s lawyer – I consider what came to my attention this morning inconceivable. We look forward to reading the reasons for this latest appeal on an issue that is now completely defined from a legal point of view. We cannot help but believe, at this point, that this is a position that has nothing to do with the object of the sentence reduction obtained by Alemanno months ago, namely theprison overcrowding. Below 3 square meters per capita per inmate it is within the scope ofinhuman and degrading detentionand therefore the prisoner himself is entitled to a reduction in sentence. It is not us who say it, but rather the judiciary unanimously which takes its starting point fromEuropean Court of Human Rights“.

The note from the Ministry of Justice

The Minister of Justice, Carlo Nordio, was not aware of the filing of the appeal in Cassation at the request of the Dicastery against the order of the Supervisory Court against Dr. Gianni Alemanno. This was made known by the same department of via Arenula which, in a note, also reports that in communicating the start of an internal investigation – with assessment of the related responsibilities – in what appears a bureaucratic mix-up within the Department of Penitentiary Administration, the Minister will provide for immediate revocation of the same appeal and “invites Dr. Alemanno to an interview at the Ministry, when he wishes. On this occasion it is communicated that the Minister’s Cabinet has already started an investigation a few days ago to verify the system for calculating the spaces of prisoners in the cells, suggested by Alemanno himself, who has demonstrated a very acceptable interest in the situation of Italian prisons”.