«I have had 24 trials in which I have always been fully acquitted».
Michele Iorio, president of the Molise Region for 12 years and now planning councilor of the Roberti council, calmly talks about the judicial harassment he had to endure. “I have a clean criminal record, but I’ve had all sorts of things,” he says, referring above all to the maxi-trial renamed the “Iorio system” which shocked Molise.
What exactly did this system consist of?
«The Iorio system was nothing more than a set of anomalies in the management of some issues, but in the end I was acquitted after eight years of trial and 44 thousand pages of wiretaps. I was bugged for over 8 months and was also tracked by a camera in my office as president for four months leading up to the election which I then lost. It seemed to me as if there was someone very interested in me losing elections after having won three in a row and having therefore governed Molise for over 12 years.”
Do you think you are the victim of judicial harassment?
«I was one of the few to also suffer the injustice of the Severino law because I had another proceeding involving a sugar factory for which I was sentenced in 2018 on appeal to a sentence of 6 months for abuse of office. A measure that cost me a lot politically. It was a judicial interference in a democratic and political process. You can make a mistake once, twice, or three times, but 24 times seems a little excessive to me.”
Have you ever thought about resigning as regional president?
«Yes, I never resigned because I never considered myself guilty. I was calm as were my fellow citizens who always elected me with a large mass of votes. That time, however, they were unable to nominate me as regional president and, therefore, once the suspension expired, I presented myself as a councilor and was re-elected.”
In these 24 trials was the prosecutor’s office always without evidence?
«It was all supposed, it’s said, it would seem. There was a clear tendency to exasperate all hypotheses and transform normal things into crimes.”
What is your opinion on the judiciary?
«I still have faith in the judiciary but there are attitudes which, also through the exasperation of the media, interfere in a
inappropriate on political choices and the correct conduct of democracy. In the end, we arrive at the truth when a person is now politically destroyed. I believe in a justice reform in a guaranteeist sense.”
