The news arrived in early afternoon today, Friday 17 May: la Taranto section of the Court of Assizes of Appeal has suspended, with an order, the enforceability of the payment to the defendants of the provisional payments granted at first instance to the civil parties in the “Ambiente Svenduto” trial – the one in which the investigation into the alleged environmental disaster caused in Taranto by the Siderurgico resulted, during the years of management of the Riva family.
In practice, they are the ones who are suspended compensation of 5,000 euros assigned to each of the 1,500 civil parties established in the process. He was the president of the Assize Court of Appeal, Antonio Del Cocoto read the order, during the second hearing of the second instance proceedings, held in the former courtroom bunker of the Court. Among the findings of the magistrates of the Court of Appeal, the quantification of commissions themselves and the risk of “insolvency”faced with the large number of civil parties: in practice, the failure to recover the sums already paid to the offended parties in the event of an acquittal on appeal of the defendants convicted in the first instance.
They are accused in the “Ambiente Svenduto” trial 37 individuals and three companies: in the first instance they were issued twenty-six convictions towards factory executives, managers and politicians, for approx 270 years in prison and with the sentence of May 31, 2021 they were arranged provisional payments of 5,000 euros towards each of the offended parties – but according to the appeal judges immediate enforceability of the payment could not be granted. Hence today’s order. Criminal association aimed at environmental disaster, willful failure to take precautions in the workplace, poisoning of food substances, corruption in judicial documents, manslaughter are the crimes contested for various reasons. In today’s hearing, the lawyers of some of the defendants reiterated their request to transfer the trial to Potenza due to presumption “environmental incompatibility”.
