The Consulta opens the way for Cospito to be reduced from his sentence

After the many "no" received in recent months by the judiciary (and also by the minister Nordio) on the revocation of the 41 bis and on the requests for deferment of the sentence and house arrest, Alfredo Cospito returns to hope.

for the attack on the School of Carabinieri students in Fossano.

Thus opening the way to the possibility, if the trial judges deem it, of also giving a less severe sentence, between 20 and 24 years, to the anarchist, who has been on hunger strike for 6 months.

In short, they will now have to decide whether to inflict life imprisonment as requested by the Turin prosecutor's office or not.

While

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However, this is a result for Cospito and his lawyer.

"We finally learn some encouraging news for everyone and all those who are called daily to apply the law or to suffer its application. Today's decision of the Constitutional Court finally restores dignity to the legal issues underlying human affairs, not least that of Alfredo Cospito," said the anarchist's defender, Flavio Rossi Albertini.

THE DAY

"The fixed penalty has been declared unconstitutional because it does not allow the penalty to be compared to the offense"

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It is one of the passages of the intervention before the Constitutional Court by the defender of Alfredo Cospito.

The Consulta must rule on the constitutionality of article 69 of the penal code, which for the crime of political massacre prevents penalty reductions in cases, such as that of Cospito, of aggravated recidivism.

A decision on which the judicial fate of the anarchist will depend, who risks seeing the 20-year sentence that he is already serving for the attack on the Carabinieri school in Fossano raised to life imprisonment. 

The attack was carried out on 2 June 2006

: two high explosive devices were placed in the waste bins near one of the entrances to the School of Fossano, there were neither dead nor injured.

Precisely in consideration of the limited damage caused by the bombs, according to the Court of Assizes of Appeal of Turin, the extenuating factor should be recognized for minor offenses, which would reduce the sentence by one third.

But for Cospito, who for that attack is liable for political massacre, punished with life imprisonment, there is an insurmountable obstacle: he has been declared a repeated recidivist and article 69 of the penal code prevents that in a case like his one can apply the discount.

And it is for this reason that

on the constitutionality of the law which appears to be contrary to the principle of proportionality of the sentence and the rehabilitation of the convict.

"My client saw the sentence pass from 15 years to the fixed sentence of life imprisonment" highlighted the lawyer Flavio Rossi Albertini, underlining the "singularity" of the Cospito affair.

The question raised by the Court of Assizes of Appeal of Turin must be declared inadmissible and unfounded

, argues the State Advocate General, Paola Zerman, with her colleague Ettore Figliolia.

This is because the acknowledgment of extenuating circumstances for the minor entity of the fact would "lead to a vulnerability in the system".

In fact, such a decision "can pave the way for other crimes such as mafia association to be recognized as minor".

"There is a basic misunderstanding on the part of the Court of Turin: the statement that where there are no dead the massacre is minor. It is like saying that the massacre for political purposes must require a concrete danger and therefore death of people. But this way we are out of the norm," Zerman noted.

Not only that: if we proceeded along this path, a breach would be opened for all crimes of danger, with consequences for other serious crimes such as mafia association.

But beyond this, it is precisely the nature of the crime charged against Cospito, a political massacre, that prevents the application of the extenuating circumstance for the State attorney's office.

It is part of the "most serious crimes" and does not punish the conduct of a madman, but of those who want to undermine the security of the state.

"And the anarchist is the one who never acts in isolation, behind there is an ideology, based on the idea that violence can win".

Cospito's conditions

"Tomorrow I will have an interview with him, we hope to already have the decision of the Council, so that we can orientate ourselves towards understanding what to do now".

This was stated by the lawyer Flavio Rossi Albertini, defender of the anarchist Alfredo Cospito, on leaving the Constitutional Court.

As for the conditions of his client, "he hasn't eaten pasta, fish and meat for 180 days. We never thought he would have arrived alive on April 18. But he lost the ability to walk, he no longer moves a foot and has lost 50 kilos of weight".