The fifth trial for the Viareggio train massacre ends with a new postponement, at least partially. The sentences were confirmed by the Court of Cassation – bis for the defendants, but for some of them – including Mauro Moretti – there is a return to the Court of Appeal in Florence, to quantify the sentence. This is the sentence issued on Monday evening by the Roman judges. For Roman judges, sentences must be redetermined based on the application of generic mitigating circumstances. «Seven degrees of judgement, it’s a joke, we’re the joke of Italy», the first immediate words of Daniela Rombi, one of the souls of “Il Mondo che would like”, the association that includes the families of the victims .
The college of magistrates, chaired by Gastone Andreazza, after the council chamber rejected the 18 appeals presented by the defendants’ lawyers against the sentence issued in the Appello-bis trial which was held in Florence in 2022. In addition to the 13 convicted defendants, there are Trenitalia, Fs, RFi and Cima Riparazioni were cited as civilly responsible. The crimes of serious and very serious injury, together with the charge of manslaughter, had already been declared time-barred and only the charge of train crash remained standing.
«The recalculation of the sentence avoids the risk of arrest for Moretti. There is certainly no risk of prison: the reduction of the sentence that could be imposed in Florence will bring it down, it will no longer be equal to five
years”. This was stated by the defense lawyer, Ambra Giovene, commenting on the Supreme Court ruling on the Viareggio massacre.
The fifth degree of judgment arrived just over 10 years after the start of the trial (dated 13 November 2013). And almost fifteen years after that 29 June 2009 which changed the history of Viareggio forever. It was 11.48pm on that cursed night, when a freight train containing LPG derailed a few hundred meters away from the railway station. The derailment caused a very violent explosion, with flames that “ate up” almost the entirety of Via Ponchielli, a road that overlooks one side of the railway. In total, 32 people lost their lives, burned alive by the flames.
Many died instantly, others suffered the same fate in the following days, due to the very serious burns caused by the fire. Over the years, the long judicial process has seen 3 of the 4 initial charges (serious and very serious negligent injuries, negligent fire and manslaughter) become statute-barred, leaving only the negligent railway disaster in the “field”. For which the 13 defendants remained in the trial, while initially there were 33.
The family members
In Rome, as always, there were the victims’ families, never absent from the courtroom in these 10 years with the exception of the first Cassation trial in 2021, due to the anti-Covid restrictions in force at that time. A bus made available by the Il Mondo che would like Association left Viareggio at dawn on Monday: the family members set up a demonstration in front of the court, before entering the courtroom.
The judicial stages
On 31 January 2017 the first degree sentence arrived in Lucca: 23 convictions for a total of 168 years in prison and 10 acquittals, to which must be added those of 5 out of 8 companies. Among those convicted, Mauro Moretti, CEO of Ferrovie in 2009, stands out. and Michele Mario Elia and Vincenzo Soprano, respectively CEO of RFI and Trenitalia at the time of the events. A few weeks later, the charges of negligent injury and negligent fire expired.
On 13 November 2018 the appeal began in court in Florence, which will close approximately 7 months later, on 20 June 2019, with the substantial confirmation of the accusatory system and the sentences for the main defendants. At the end of 2020 the trial reaches the Supreme Court, with a ruling of 8 January 2021 which drops the aggravating circumstance of the accident in the workplace, also causing the charge of manslaughter to expire and sending the documents back to court in Florence for the remodulation of sentences.
On June 30, 2022, the day after the thirteenth anniversary of the massacre, the appeal sentence arrived – bis, which saw Moretti’s sentence reduced to 5 years. Now a new postponement.
January 15, 2024
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