A third court of appeal in less than four years, that of Lyon, seized on Friday February 24 of the fate of Vincenzo Vecchi, an Italian far-left activist who took refuge in France but claimed by his country after his heavy conviction for violence in the G8 of 2001 in Genoa.
The case is sensitive, touching on European judicial cooperation, but also indirectly on history, since the legislation on which Italy relied in its arrest warrant dates back to the fascist era.
offense of "devastation and pillage"
When Vincenzo Vecchi, 49, was arrested on August 8, 2019 in Saint-Gravé (Morbihan), a few kilometers from his home in Rochefort-en-Terre, it was indeed under the offense of "devastation and
pillage
introduced into the penal code under Mussolini.
Political weapon, it allows to repress from eight to fifteen years of imprisonment, for complicity, the participation in a major disorder with the public order by a simple “
moral contest
”.
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On this basis, Vincenzo Vecchi had thus been definitively sentenced to 10 years in prison in 2012, found guilty of violence during the demonstrations against the G8 summit in Genoa in July 2001. Clashes between anti-globalization activists and law enforcement had killed one person, a young autonomous Italian shot in the head by a rifleman, and more than 500 injured.
“Politics of Hunt and Revenge”
Since his conviction, Vincenzo Vecchi has taken refuge in Brittany.
He is now an employee and partner of a cooperative for the construction of houses with wood and straw frames, located in Questembert (Morbihan), near Rochefort-en-Terre where he lives with his partner.
Twice already, the courts of appeal of Angers and Rennes have refused to execute the European arrest warrant issued against him.
In November 2019, that of Rennes had deemed irregular "
the procedure for the execution
" of this mandate.
On this occasion, Vincenzo Vecchi had denounced “
a policy of tracking and revenge
”.
This judgment having been quashed, the Angevin judges, a year later, had justified their refusal because this penalty of “
devastation and pillage
” had no equivalent in French criminal law.
"Dual Criminality"
Thus, Vincenzo Vecchi was sentenced when he was simply "
near
" the places of damage to a bank and a vehicle, "
a concept with vague outlines
" which could not "
on its own
" represent "
a constituent element of complicity
”, according to the court.
It is this notion of “
double incrimination
”, according to which the incrimination of the country issuing the warrant must have its equivalence in the one to which it is addressed, that the defense of Vincenzo Vecchi intends to put forward again in Lyon.
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However, it had suffered a setback in this field when the Court of Justice of the European Union (CUEJ), seized by the Court of Cassation, had estimated last July that "perfect correspondence" was not required
and
that France could therefore not oppose the extradition.
The Court of Cassation then, last November, quashed the judgment delivered in Angers and referred the case to the Lyon Court of Appeal.
A very active defense committee
“
If France were to hand over Mr. Vecchi to Italy, it would be giving up its most essential principles of fundamental rights.
I don't understand what the stakes of the French state are in this file.
As for the CUEJ, it considers that collaboration between States must be built at all costs... European citizens are the victims of this system which has lost its meaning", thunders Catherine
Glon, the Italian activist's lawyer, "
not ready to accept that (his) country applies a fascist law
”.
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Vincenzo Vecchi's support committee, very present at each trial, is on the same line.
He wants to believe that French justice will "
honour itself by putting an end to this incredible judicial relentlessness (...) by preventing the introduction of a fascist law into the European legal space
".
In a column in Le
Monde
on February 9, the Nobel Prize for Literature Annie Ernaux or the directors Ken Loach and Volker Schlöndorff, use similar terms, for the same conclusion: "
Three courts of appeal, that's enough
".
