ANCONA – Was there authorization from the Superintendence to restore five historic benches in Piazza Cavour? For the Prosecutor’s Office, which investigated after a question asked in the city council by the then League councilor, Antonella Andreoli, no. For the defense of the former chief engineer of the Municipality, who ended up on trial, yes. The catch was a subcontract. In the end Luciano Lucchetti was right and the court acquitted him yesterday “because the fact does not exist”. Judge Tiziana Fancello decided it. The issue concerned the iron and cast iron benches that characterize the central square of Ancona. Art Nouveau benches dating back to 1920 and featuring General Diaz’s text on the back following the victory in the First World War. Publicly owned assets, which are over 70 years old and which are among the list of those protected by a specific law which requires prior authorization from the Superintendency for Archaeology, Fine Arts and the Landscape of the Marche. In December 2019, the former chief engineer of the Municipality, who at the time of the events was manager of the planning, maintenance, traffic, landslide, civil protection and safety management of Palazzo del Popolo, had restoration work carried out on the five benches, to a company from San Paolo di Jesi which then subcontracted the work to a company from Emilia. The Superintendency would not have been asked for an opinion on the accusation.
The former manager had opposed a criminal conviction decree and, defended by the lawyer Roberto Tiberi, preferred to go to trial to demonstrate that the requests were there. «This is the 34th trial I face – said Lucchetti at the end of the trial – always acquitted. I’ve been retired for seven years, nothing should be coming by now. For me it’s routine, I can’t say it’s a nightmare because I’ve never experienced it as such. Fortunately, I’m not the type to somatize and I was confident in a positive result.” The story of the restoration emerged after the municipal councilor Andreoli had asked for an account of one of the five historic benches that ended up on display at the cast iron museum in Longiano, a municipality in the Romagna region. The company that was supposed to restore it would have kept some of the pieces, the backrest engraved with the war bulletin which was then assembled with other parts. For a year she was to be on display at the museum which she had contributed to the restoration. The bench was then seized. Four have returned to Piazza Cavour, there was no news of the fifth but it is now in the art gallery in Ancona. The two companies that had handled the work, the contracting company and the subcontracting company, had ended up in the investigation which then expanded to include the former municipal manager.
