Natural or Habitual Delinquent?
Without ‘HIS’ laws, he would’ve been in jail since quite a while.
By: Bruno TINTI.
Introduced, Translated and Commented by : Ahmed ELNAHAS – Montopoli October 28th 2012.
The court sentenced Silvio Berlusconi¹ to 4 years incarceration and 5 years ban from any public function along with a multi million euro in penalty fine to the Treasury Department, in relation to him being found guilty of committing the crimes of “Tax Evasion” and “Fraud” finalised to favour his firms in a blatant illegal competition for the TV broadcasting rights.
The most important part that is causing the feverish debates all over the Italian political arena, we find in the Sentence Motivations. A single phrase which defined the accused as “Habitual Delinquent”!! However, that’s not what really made the accused lose control and attack not only the Italian Juridical Authority altogether, but as well the whole of the Italian Institutions: the Government, The Presidency, the Media, the Supreme Court, the Opposition, the Political Parties, and the Magistrates National Assembly.. He even took for imbeciles the Italian citizens who don’t know how to vote and promised to re-candidate for office “…for something must be done, and I intend to change things”..
Also he spelled his wrath upon the European partners: the Commission, the European Central Bank, the German Chancellor Merkell and the French Ex President Sarckozy. But specially Merkell because she, as he puts it “..while presenting the forecasts for the ‘SPREAD’ as a standard measuring tool for comparing the real value of the Italian Bonds to those of Germany and relating them to the ‘Gross National Product’, did not include in her math the SUBMERGED ENTRIES, just to make the spread wider”!!!
As if he wanted that the Italian financial situation be liable for “Illegal Finances, Investments and Profits” which of course everyone, with the least common sense, knows that they are impossible to weigh or measure.. Just look at his case having hundreds of millions of illegally collected money stacked offshore in the Caiman Islands banking paradise.
The author, Mr. Tinti who’s an established Constitutional Magistrate and member of the Barr, is a regular legal analyst in collaboration mainly with the Italian daily independent² newspaper “Il Fatto Quotidiano”; in his article he is simply showing us that the Italians have chosen not once but three times a Convicted Criminal to hold the reigns of their destinies as their Prime Minster; and he’s showing that by explaining the subject’s record.. After which I will allow myself a relevant comment. So I’ll leave you now with Mr. Tinti wishing that you’d enjoy reading.
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That Berlusconi is a tax evader (also a corruptor, an accounts falser, a false testimonial) isn’t a novelty; the novelty is that today, instead of deducing such his qualities out from a prescription sentence and having to explain to many friends of his that he was guilty but that too much time had passed before being able to send him to prison; today we can read it in tranquility into a sentence.
He evaded the treasury and he got 4 years, out of which 3 are pardoned (due a tailored law made by/for him and voted in parliament even by the opposition back in early 90s), 5 years to not practice any public office on top of a good number of millions of euro.
The novelty of this sentence, cited in the name of the Italian People, is that it says officially what millions of persons were convinced ever since 20 years: “Berlusconi is a Natural Delinquent”. It must be said that such a phrase bears a juridical significance different from what it might have been should the precedent trials were concluded otherwise; said as though means only that the guilt of Berlusconi while defined as such would recommend certain punishment rather than another.
But how could the verdict result if Berlusconi - the prescribed for life, amnestied, absolved via laws done by him in person and to his favour – should have been condemned as deserved??
First of all he would have been declared “Habitual Delinquent” according to Art.102 of the penal code: presumed regular by law, which reads: “Is declared Regular/Habitual Delinquent the one who, after having been condemned to serve all in all a superior measure of five years for three non culpable offenses of same nature and committed within ten years; and contextually, gets another conviction for a crime non culpable and of same nature within the ten years following the last of the previous offenses”).
The non culpable crimes to which Berlusconi have benefited the prescription are 7:
1. Corruption: The Lodo Mondadori case.
2. Illegal Financing to Political Parties: The All Iberian Case (aka the Bettino CRAXI bribes).
3. False Accounting: The Consolidato Fininvest case.
4. False Accounting: The Fininvest Balance Sheets 1988/92 case.
5. Embezzlement: same case.
6. False Accounting: The Lentini case.
7. Corruption: The MILLS case.
Those concluded con Amnesty are 2:
1. False Testimony: The Macherio terrains case.
2. False Accounting: same case.
Those where he got absolved because the acts committed are no longer considered as crimes by the law (Berlusconi made a law depenalising the False Accounting act) are 2:
1. False Accounting: The All Iberian 2 case
2. False Accounting: The SME – Ariosto case.
In fact Berlusconi could have also been considered a “Regular/Habitual Delinquent” as per Art.103 of the Penal Code whereby it reads: “The declaration of habituality in crime is also pronounced against who has been condemned for two non culpable crimes and have brought another condemning verdict for another non culpable crime, if the judge, considering the nature and gravity of the crimes, in the time by which they were committed, of the conduct and life style of the convicted become addicted to crime”.
Such would have been valid for the Mediaset sentences, but actually ‘Saint Prescription, Saint Amnesty and Saint Depenalisation’ have all come to grant him pardon.
However it doesn’t end here, because the crimes committed by Berlusconi are as much and as such that Art. 105 could have been well applied ‘Professionalism in Crime’, where it reads: “Who fits the requested conditions to be declared in a state of Habituality/Regularity in crime, and brings a conviction for another offence, is declared a Professional Delinquent or Offender, if having regarded the nature of the crime and the life style of the convicted, would suggest that the convicted regularly lives from the proceeds of crime”.
But why should we keep moaning and weeping that the Paradise Saints have come to absolve him? Only because it is unjust? Yes, certainly. But also because Art 109 (Effects of the declaration of Habituality, Professionalism or Tendency to crime) foresee the application of security measures towards the Regular or Professional type of criminals, Measures that among others include to assign the convict to an agriculture colony or a labour house.
Would you imagine Berlusconi with the chained ball in his foot and in the striped pyjamas trying to mow the grass? I confess that this vision of him in that state would repay me some of all the rage I gulped throughout the past 20 years.
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After such amusing, and educating, reading; let me share a few thoughts with you.. Yesterday I came across a two line news while streaming the Egyptian Newspapers on the web:
“It has been reported that the Tora Prison guards always give the military salute to the convict Mohamed Hosni MUBARAK, and as well his cast already in custody..”!!!
I don’t have a problem with the guards or even the Prison officials (considering the mentality and culture).. But I have a problem with our intellectuals (artists, journalists, law university professors, sociologists, anthropologists, psychologists, religious references, painters, Egyptologists, bloggers, writers, poets, song writers, singers, and lawmakers).
Because I expected that they should’ve been the ones to grab the illuminating torch and lead the way to guide their fellow Egyptians on the right path of knowledge, the path of the truthful free information.. Only through knowing things as they are, one can decide and chose.. RATIONALLY not Emotionally.
So, now I wish to know:
Ø How deep the Egyptian Investigation Journalism, if it really exists, can penetrate into the news?
Ø Where are the expert impartial analysts who could analyse and explain to the average Egyptian citizen the long chains of wrong doings of the ousted president, his family, his cabinets, his friends, his cast and courtesans, and all the breed of corruptive/corruptor officials and public servants?
Ø Who will inform us, in simple words, the profound paradox of the conflicting laws that were tailored to create legal chaos in our courts, to slow the proceedings in order to burden the Magistrates, and to grant the acquittal for the guilty and bring the conviction upon the innocent?
Ø Why is criticising, commenting, debating or arguing about a public servant of the people; can be considered by law and act of slander to be celebrated in our courts?
And my question to the SCM is:
Will your class take the initiative to clear the dust off your respectful institution, the only remaining defender and custodian of legal and civil rights, same as your elder brothers did in the past two centuries?
Find the answers for me please, and..
Pass On The Word.
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