Borsellino misdirection: “Scarantino slanderer”, in July the sentence

(from the correspondent Elvira Terranova) – The false repentant Vincenzo Scarantino is “a slanderer” who “has never been indoctrinated” or “by policemen or magistrates”. It is still the former repentant, who had falsely accused the innocents of the Via d’Amelio massacre, at the center of the defense pleading of the lawyer Giuseppe Panepinto, lawyer of Mario Bo, one of the three policemen accused of complicity in aggravated slander in the trial for the misdirection of the Borsellino massacre. The other two defendants are Michele Ribaudo and Fabrizio Mattei. “No one, neither policemen nor prosecutors, induced Vincenzo Scarantino to tell the false. There was no behavior, not even of the magistrates, that induced Scarantino to make false declarations. Here we find ourselves in the presence of serial slanderers who continue to exploit a criminal trial to do what they deem appropriate “, accuses Giuseppe Panepinto. The prosecutor of Caltanissetta, Salvatore De Luca, at the end of the indictment, had asked for 11 years and 10 months for Mario Bo and nine and a half years each for the other two policemen. The sentence will be issued in early July, as President Francesco D’Arrigo said at the end of the hearing. Addressing the Court, the lawyer Panepinto recalled the ‘Borsellino quater’ trial, in which Scarantino was also accused of slander and explained: “In the sentence against Scarantino, who is convicted of slander, the mitigating circumstance is recognized and therefore the not having to proceed due to the statute of limitations – he says – Scarantino had every interest in discharging his responsibilities onto others. If he had not done so he would have had to serve a sentence, and could not have benefited from the statute of limitations. Therefore, there is an interest in make these false claims. ” And he reiterates that Vincenzo Scarantino, before the trial hearings, “was not indoctrinated, as the prosecution says, but he was a very normal study in preparation for the hearing”. “Dr. Antonino Di Matteo also told us in the classroom”, former prosecutor and today a councilor of the CSM. “The collaborator gets ready, it is not an offense, perhaps a questionable practice from the ethical point of view but it is not an offense. The prosecutor Di Matteo said that he has always prepared his collaborators. For example, saying ‘be careful, review the his statements’ or because during the cross-examination he could receive objections “.” The quater was a trial against the absent or dead “And then Mario Bo’s lawyer adds:” The Borsellino quater trial was a trial against the absent, a series of arguments are introduced concerning the induction of subjects who are not part of the trial, or because they are dead or because they are not accused and therefore cannot defend themselves. provided “. The lawyer then recalls the investigation by the Messina Prosecutor’s Office on the two magistrates, Annamaria Palma and Carmelo Petralia, under investigation for aggravated slander, again for the same circumstances as the three policemen now accused in Caltanissetta. But the investigating judge in that case closed the investigation into the magistrates. “What does the Messina Public Prosecutor do? – says Panepinto – Call the eyewitnesses, those who were present at the Scarantino interrogations, then call the magistrates, not just Palma and Petralia, then call the lawyers who were present at the time, the defenders of Scarantino, all to see if Scarantino’s accusations could really find a foundation. And after concluding they said that there was not a single element of objective confirmation of Scarantino’s statements. slander”. And he reiterates: “Even in this trial Scarantino has continued to slander, he has only corrected the shooting, on the magistrates, then he takes a step back by unloading everything on the policemen, and so on”. “Scarantino talks about pauses and suggestions, which here becomes ‘indoctrination’. Not even Scarantino has ever talked about indoctrination. – continues Panepinto – I do not think that on this circumstance, on the modalities in which the interrogations took place and on the possibility of any suggestions there was only one question asked to the interviewed subjects, certainly no questions were asked to the policemen, both from the Falcone and Borsellino group and to outsiders, no questions to the lawyers, who were never asked to ask what happened during the interrogations “. Then, the lawyer Panepinto, speaks of who was “denigrated” in this process. State men who fought against the mafia. “During this trial we heard magistrates who have marked the history of Italy, excellent names followed one another. People who investigated Tangentopoli, people who dismembered the Cosa Nostra. And it is not allowed, even on a moral level , who discredits himself on subjects who are not present and cannot defend themselves or on people who are dead and who cannot defend themselves. They have said all sorts of things about Dr. Giovanni Tinebra. He who made the courthouse tremble. Caltanissetta and half of Italy with its investigations. Those who cannot defend themselves cannot be accused. Prefects, quaestors who have served the state for years, suspected of having reached an agreement to cover up the misdeeds of the accused “. ‘About La Barbera all sorts of things have been said’ The lawyer Panepinto, then speaking of the former head of the Palermo Mobile Arnaldo La Barbera, who led the Falcone and Borsellino investigative group, which included the three accused policemen, Mario Bo, Michele Ribaudo and Fabrizio Mattei, says: “All sorts of things have been said about La Barbera, including that he was a man close to the mafia”. La Barbera died in 2002. “Certain things cannot be heard in a court of law. All the more so about a person with a brilliant career like that of Arnaldo La Barbera. But in this process he becomes a person” on the payroll of the mafia. “And he adds:” We cannot convict on the basis of suspicions, we need proof, while what happens here? In this trial all the witnesses, when they moved away from the accusatory system, were accused of conniving or wanting to protect the accused, or of giving false testimony “.” Prosecutor Giovanni Tinebra with his inquiries made half of Italy tremble and now, after his death, everything and more is said about him: friend of services and much more. In recent days in Atlantis I have heard a far-fetched statement. That Tinebra refused to question Paolo Borsellino who asked to be questioned after the Capaci massacre. Tinebra took office at the Caltanissetta prosecutor’s office on 15 July 1992 and an explosive situation was found, there was the Capaci massacre and after just 4 days there was via D’Amelio. On the events of Palermo when he should have questioned him? To find out about the talks on collaborator Gaspare Mutolo? “.” It is not morally correct to say that Tinebra wanted to cover up the investigation – adds the lawyer – We have to tell you these things. “Continuing the long defense, the lawyer Panepinto talks about the 126 used by Cosa Nostra to kill Paolo Borsellino. “The car used for the car bomb in the Via D’Amelio massacre was identified on the same afternoon of July 19, 1992. The suspicions that have insinuated into it are useless”, he says, addressing the Court . “It is another myth that is dispelled when it is said that one could not immediately know that the car used for the massacre was a 126”. “The first agency launch that hypothesizes that the car bomb used for the massacre was a 126 was an Adnkronos of July 19 at 22.49. He says that it is not known for sure what car bomb it was but that various investigative sources spoke of a 600 or a 126 or an Ibiza – says the lawyer of Mario Bo – So already from an indication of a 126 or 600 “.” On July 20 Sicily comes out in which reference is made to the fact that the car was a small car. “And then he cites a service report in which there is talk of a 126.” Truncating documentary evidence, “he says. The defensive speeches will continue on Thursday 9 June. Giuseppe Panepinto will speak again, then he will pass the baton to his colleague Giuseppe Seminara, who defends Mattei and Ribaudo. The lawyer will also intervene on June 14 and 17. Then a two-week stop. And in early July the first instance sentence.