THE ENVIRONMENTAL INCOMPATIBILITY OF ITALIAN JUDGES IN THE FREE TERRITORY OF TRIESTE AND THE ROLE OF THE ANM (ASSOCIAZIONE NAZIONALE MAGISTRATI / ITALIAN NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF MAGISTRATES).
The legal acts are clear. In Trieste, judicial authorities are repressing anyone who dares admit Italy has no sovereignty over the Free Territory of Trieste. Because that sovereignty is being simulated since 60 years. And the Court of Trieste is not immune from it. There are judges here denying the very Italian laws that recognize Trieste’s independence.
The repressive actions target the Free Trieste Movement in particular. They do so with political attacks (supported also by the press), incitement of individuals and authorities, often explicitly, against its leaders, but also against its members, and mere supporters.
The Movement’s lawyers are not immune from such attacks either.
Back in 2013, the President of the Criminal Section of the Court of Trieste, Filippo Gulotta, released a public statement calling for the Bar Association to take disciplinary against one of them. Why? Because he was the Movement’s main lawyer. That’s it.
Mr. Gulotta is the same judge who called for actions against Free Trieste addressing the local branch of the Italian National Association of Magistrates (ANM – Associazione Nazionale Magistrati) as well as the local Prosecution Office.
Punitive actions from the Prosecution Office and censorship by the political branch of Italian magistracy.
He achieved both, and this lead to a tense atmosphere: armed policemen patrolling the Court whenever Free Trieste’s supporters stood trial, and identifying anyone willing to attend (criminal hearings are public).
This happened with all of Trieste’s prosecution office’s proceedings, initiated by Public Prosecutor Federico Frezza.
He, side by side with local newspaper “Il Piccolo” did go as far as threatening to put on file Free Trieste’s members and supporters (claiming to have sent the police to seize membership lists from the organization’s head office). He threatened public servants with the loss of their jobs, and the elderly with the loss of their pensions.
A situation worth a police regime. Certainly not democratic State.
This repression brings back memories from the dark Fascist era: back then special courts were the norm, and the prosecuted’s only right was being punished.
Isn’t the Free Territory of Trieste a democratic State, entrusted to the administration of a democratic State’s Government? Shouldn’t Italy be a democracy?
How comes that, in spite of the rules of its own statute, the ANM stays silent about the Italian Magistracy’s roles and duties under the very Italian Constitution?
The Rule of Law should be a priority in a democracy.
So why is a body that claims to represent the vast majority of the judiciary do nothing about a situation that is abnormal since the real beginning?
Unless it is normal threatening others, exercising political pressing through the judiciary. Why else would the ANM refuse to dispute Mr. Gullotta’s threats against Free Trieste, its members, and its supporters?
Apparently Free Trieste’s members and supporters, of any citizen of the Free Territory of Trieste, for the matter, cannot expressed their own political views.
Indeed, the ANM claims that 96.8% of Italian magistrates in service – 8334 out of 8608 – belong to it and adhere to all of its political directives (despite officially having four internal political groups). Again, going by its representatives’ claims, Mr. Gulotta’s opinions were never denied. Nobody disputed such prejudicial, political opinions against the Free Trieste Movement, its members, its supporters and even its lawyers, being expressed in the name of the judiciary.
How is is possible that, facing such an attack to legality, the Bar Association remained silent?
The Court of Cassation must answer all those questions, and soon. Because what is happening in Trieste does constitutes an act of subversion against Italian laws. Only, it is the Italian authorities to commit it, not Free Trieste.
In the Movement’s most recent appeal, when it comes to the Italian National Association of Magistrates, we denounced that:
“…the existence of such a secret organization (Namely: Italian National Association of Magistrates) whose members are unknown to the public and, in particular, to those subject to its jurisdiction, which Dr. Gulotta has “called to war against the Free Trieste Movement”, confirms a state of environmental incompatibility when it comes to Trieste’s Court”.
The law prohibits organizations whose members are unknown to the public. Each citizen has the right to know to which political body or corporation belongs the authority that judges them. Especially when that body has called for a “crusade” against people on political grounds.
The Court of Cassation, but there is more.
Next year, the citizens of the Free Territory of Trieste are most certainly addressing also international courts. And the abuses they suffered from the Italian judicial authorities won’t be irrelevant in this trial in the name of legality.
Translated from blog “Ambiente e Legalità” – “Environment and Legality” by Roberto Giurastante