L’AQUILA – Finally, after 12 years, the affair involving the brothers Franco and Sergio Celi, accused of various crimes at the time, has come to an end. The Court of Appeal of L’Aquila, to which the lawyers of the Celi brothers, lawyer Antonio Milo and lawyer Claudio Verini had appealed, appealing against the first degree verdict which they considered unjust and erroneous, issued a ruling of 5 February 2024, which became definitive, absolving the Celi brothers of all the crimes alleged against them, therefore also for the crime of misappropriation of inert material, since the fact does not exist, and for the crime of waste trafficking pursuant to art. 256 of Legislative Decree 152/06, acquitting Sergio Celi for not having committed the crime and acquitting Franco Celi.
“We are happy that in the end justice has taken its course, we have always been certain of the correctness of our actions and of the fact that sooner or later we would have been able to prove it”, said the Celi brothers, “they have been very difficult years especially in relations with public administrations and their officials, from some of whom we have tangibly perceived adversity and caution, following the start of the legal case, unfortunately amplified (excessively) by the media.
The work of the Celi Calcestruzzi spa company has always been characterized by a strong professional work ethic and maximum correctness in compliance with the laws and it is only thanks to this that, despite the presence of a general context that is far from optimal, the Company has managed to obtain continuity of growth both in terms of employment, today offering work to around 150 employees, and in economic terms, placing itself among the main companies in the province of L’Aquila, so much so that in the years 2021 and 2022 it has obtained highly specialized networks, prestigious awards for management performance and financial reliability”.
The Celi brothers, in recalling some bad moments that accompanied this affair, including the notification of the precautionary measures at 5.30 in the morning, the house arrest which lasted 13 days and annulled by the Review Court of L’Aquila, the acquittal of the accusation of crime of corruption by the GUP of the Court of L’Aquila with the broadest formula (the fact does not exist), the preventive seizures of personal assets also declared illegitimate by the Court of Review, wanted to thank “all the people who they have always made their support and esteem towards us felt and that they have always believed in the correctness of our actions, despite all the heavy accusations we have received since the beginning of the matter. The outcome of the sentence gives us, our collaborators, our clients, our partners and the public administration the full truth about the facts contested at the time and demonstrates how inconsistent and unfounded the accusations against us were”.
The lawyer Antonio Milo underlined the particular importance assumed in the entire affair by the ruling of the GUP of the Court of L’Aquila, subsequently confirmed by the Court of Cassation, which at the end of the preliminary investigations pronounced, already in 2014, a ruling of no place to proceed for the crime of corruption, which the Public Prosecutor’s Office had contested and which had led to the application of the house arrest of the Celi brothers, noting the absence of any illicit conduct and affirming the total groundlessness of the accusatory hypothesis, which makes it appear the restrictive measures on personal freedom ordered against the latter are unjust.
In turn, the lawyer Claudio Verini, with reference to the entrepreneurial activities of Celi Calcestruzzi Spa, highlighted the misrepresentation, committed by the Public Prosecutor’s Office and the Court of First Instance, of the real content of the contractual and administrative documents on the basis of the which the Company had been authorized to carry out the extraction activities and the subsequent rehabilitation of the quarry located in the Municipality of Magliano de’ Marsi, underlining that also on these aspects the Court of Appeal affirmed the absolute correctness of the brothers’ actions Celi and the Company, recognizing that they managed the excavation and rehabilitation activities of the quarry in absolute compliance with the relevant project, thus excluding any hypothesis of theft or misappropriation of gravel or the construction of an unauthorized landfill.
“Our clients have freed themselves from an enormous burden”, concluded the lawyers, “for them they were morally difficult years, in which they had to fight against accusations considered unjust and above all against a merciless media pillory. We are grateful to the judges of the Court of Appeal and even before that of the Court of Cassation who recognized the correctness of the actions of our clients. Today the Court of Appeal of L’Aquila put an end to a story that had enormous impact on the work and family lives of two innocent, worthy and respectable people. It took years of legal battles, but now we can say we are satisfied, justice has been done.”
