The sentence for Claudio Foti, the psychotherapist involved in the ‘Angels and Demons’ investigation into the alleged illicit custody in the Val d’Enza Reggiana, is overturned in the second instance. The Court of Appeal of Bologna in fact acquitted him of all charges: for not having committed the crime from abuse of office and because the crime does not exist from the crime of grievous bodily harm. Also confirmed the acquittal of the charge of procedural fraud. In the first instance in Reggio Emilia he had been sentenced to four years. The founder of the non-profit organization Hansel & Gretel welcomed the sentence, which came after a long session of deliberation, with emotion.
“Truth and justice have won, after four years of pillory. I cried, the accusatory theorem cracked”. is Foti’s comment on reading the acquittal sentence. Foti, founder of the Piedmontese non-profit organization ‘Hansel & Gretel’ was tried in abbreviated form and was considered a key figure in the investigation by the Reggio Emilia prosecutor’s office. “Foti was redeemed after four years of humiliation and persecution as a man and as a psychotherapist”, commented the lawyer Luca Bauccio. The Attorney General, with the acting prosecutor Lucia Musti, explains that the reasons will be read and the outcome will assess whether there is space for an appeal to the Cassation.
The process
The sentence comes while the trial in Reggio Emilia is underway for another 17 defendants, those who, unlike the founder of the Piedmontese non-profit organization Hansel & Gretel, have chosen the ordinary procedure and not the abbreviated one. But it can be significant because the abuse of office charged against Foti was committed, in the hypothesis of accusation, in competition with the mayor of Bibbiano Andrea Carletti, in relation to the assignment without competition, to his association, of the psychotherapy service in the Union of Val d’Enza. The injuries, on the other hand, concerned the psychological damage suffered, again for the prosecution, by a very young patient: anxiety, depression and other disorders, caused by the sessions in which she had participated.
The accusations
Foti in particular was accused of having given her the belief that she had been sexually abused by her father and of having subjected her to the EMDR technique, the controversial ‘memory machine’, “in total violation of the reference protocols”. This was precisely one of the episodes that was talked about the most, when the investigation exploded in the summer of 2019, with the precautionary measures carried out by the carabinieri, hitting Emilia and becoming one of the most cited investigations in recent years by politics. Which split and exploited it: ‘Angels and Demons’ set the electoral campaign for the Regional elections in Emilia-Romagna on fire at the beginning of 2020, when Bibbiano, the town of Mayor Carletti, a member of the Democratic Party, became a place of dispute and rallies, ended up on T-shirts worn in parliament and aroused constant controversy. At the center of an alleged illicit business, linked to the world of foster care, but on which the judges still have to largely express their opinion. “This affair – said the lawyer Bauccio – was used for an instrumental campaign by politicians deeply in bad faith”.