Today’s sentence comes in the aftermath of an important operation by the Guardia di Finanza which dismantled a criminal organization operating between Puglia and Abruzzo dedicated to drug trafficking, with 31 precautionary measures carried out and assets worth around 2 million seized. Among them also from Andria.
«The sentence appeared to me to be in line with what the entire accusatory and investigative system was – comments the mayor Giovanna Bruno – These are important and clear prison and restrictive sentences, for subjects who have habitually stained the city with immorality, with deep-rooted and reiterated underworld criminal phenomena which have caused serious damage to decorum, image, the concept of health and well-being which should always be guaranteed in a community and of which the mayor is the highest expression. The Municipality also formed a civil party in order to request compensation for all this damage caused and to create a “warning” impact for everyone. The ruling provides that for compensation the Municipality will have to initiate a separate ordinary proceeding for the quantification. We also take action in this sense to be consequential. The ruling also provides for the revocation of all those aid and assistance measures that the defendants have enjoyed over time (unemployment benefits, social allowance, social pension and civil disability pension possibly received).
The city of Andria has an ancient and ever new stain, linked to trafficking and widespread illegality that revolves around drugs. I think of the first recipients of this violent machine of human destruction, who are our children, our young people, exposed to the risk of a continuous market that feeds on their naivety many times over.
I am grateful to the police forces, the prosecutor’s office, the judiciary, to all the women and men of the state in various capacities engaged in the daily fight against crime – concludes the first citizen – A municipal administration cannot do otherwise, on the contrary:
it must be the first solid link in every and most appropriate prevention and curbing action, creating the conditions for the growth of a more aware, more responsible, less silenced and more collaborative community”.
