A day of events for the fifteenth anniversary of the tragedywhich will culminate at 9pm with the gathering of thousands of people at the Chiesina dei Pescatori. The procession it will then arrive at the Casina dei Ricordi in via Ponchielli where at 11.48pm – the hour and minute of the explosion 15 years ago, caused by the derailment of a freight train containing LPG – the names of the 32 victims.
The process
Last January 15, the second trial of the Supreme Court of Cassation definitively established the guilt of the 13 defendants accused of negligent train disaster.
Between them Mauro Moretti and Michele Mario Eliaformer CEO of Ferrovie and RFI, respectively sentenced to 5 years and 4 years and 2 monthswhose final sentence will however have to be redefined during a new appeal trial (sixth level of judgment in this case).
Instead, it is found Vincenzo Soprano has been in prison since January, former CEO of Trenitalia, whose sentence – also in this case to 4 years and 2 months – has become final. At the start of the first degree trial – November 2013, in Lucca – there were 4 charges for the 33 initial defendants: serious and very serious negligent injury, negligent fire, multiple manslaughter and negligent train disaster.
The first two ended up in prescription already after the first degree; the manslaughter had a similar outcome after the first trial in Cassation – January 2021 – dropped the aggravating circumstance of the accident in the workplace.
Mattarella: «Transport safety is an indicator of civility»
“Safety in transport, like safety at work, is an indicator of civility that must prevail over any logic of profit, because it affects people’s lives. This is a lesson that must never be forgotten – commented the President of the Republic Sergio Mattarella – On the night of 29 June 2009, Viareggio was injured by the consequences of a train disaster which, now as then, seems unacceptable to us. The images and memory of that tragedy remain indelible. On the fifteenth anniversary, the Republic is close to the families who saw their loved ones unexpectedly taken from their lives and who, in pain, were able to start a civil process to ascertain the responsibilities of what happened and to promote, everywhere, greater safety in transport”.
