By Emilio Parodi and Gavin Jones

MILAN (Reuters) – Roberto Bachis, a 58-year-old Italian accountant, was acquitted of two fraud charges in 2019 after 11 years of trials and investigations that ruined his health, finances and marriage.

A client arrested for fraudulent bankruptcy in 2008 pleaded guilty and negotiated a lighter sentence saying she acted on his advice. Bachis was sentenced to three years in prison, before being cleared on appeal in 2014.

Meanwhile, he was indicted in 2013 for another fraud case involving a state contract for solar panels, for which he was finally acquitted three years ago.

“All of this has completely destroyed my life,” says Bachis, who is undergoing treatment for depression after separating from his wife and being forced to take out a mortgage on his house in Sardinia after being unable to work due to his illnesses. legal issues.

Bachis’ story is not unusual in a country where trials have dragged on so long that their speeding up is a condition set by the European Union to release billions of euros in pandemic recovery funds due to Italy until in 2026.

The problem discourages foreign investment, undermines trust in the legal system and is a major drag on the growth of the eurozone’s third-largest economy.

“First criminal cases in Italy last three times longer than the European average, appeals last eight times longer,” says Gian Luigi Gatta, a professor of criminal law who advises Italian Justice Minister Marta Cartabia.

“We’re used to it,” Gatta says. “Italy is like a cripple so used to limping that he doesn’t even realize he’s limping.”

While many previous reforms had achieved little, Prime Minister Mario Draghi is now proposing to cancel trials without a verdict if they extend beyond a fixed period.

The move came after the European Commission made part of its 200 billion euro ($201 billion) pandemic recovery fund for Italy conditional on reducing the length of trials by 25% over five years in criminal cases and 40% in civil cases, where the situation is even worse.

The reform, probably the most controversial of Draghi’s 17-month term as prime minister, is due to be finalized this month. Critics say it will allow thousands of criminals to escape justice.

“You cannot simply reduce the duration of trials by decree, you need a series of measures to improve the functioning of the system”, says Gian Carlo Caselli, retired judge and former chief prosecutor of Palermo and Turin .

He called for measures to encourage plea bargaining and discourage defendants from systematically appealing verdicts.

It takes an average of 361 days for a criminal case to result in a first conviction in Italy, estimates the Council of Europe, a human rights watchdog, in its latest report. It is the longest of all 46 member states in the group.

And after the first verdict, the situation only gets worse.

In Italy, unlike most countries, the defendant has an almost automatic right of appeal – not once, but twice. And the Crown can do the same if the accused is acquitted.

Until this lengthy appeals process is exhausted, previous verdicts have no practical consequences, much like the score after the first half of a football match.

Appeals court proceedings are even slower than initial trials, so a final conviction takes on average more than four years. Italy has been convicted by the European Court of Human Rights more than 1,200 times for the duration of its legal proceedings, twice as many as any other country.

According to the Ministry of Justice’s own data, more recent than that of the Council of Europe and calculated differently, the average length of criminal trials in 2021 was 467 days for first cases and 784 for first appeals.

The courts are overwhelmed. Prosecutors are required by law to open a case if there is a complaint, and everyone appeals because there is no incentive to do so. A sentence cannot be increased on appeal and people can even appeal after a plea bargain.

The Bank of Italy has estimated that the slowness of the civil justice system alone subtracts 1 percentage point from Italy’s anemic economic growth each year. He made no estimate of the impact of slow criminal trials.

Under Draghi’s reform, if a criminal case lasts more than two years on the first appeal, or more than a year on the second, it will be declared “unprosecutable” and dropped without a verdict.

Nicola Gratteri, a prominent anti-Mafia prosecutor, calls it a “guillotine”, meaning 50% of cases will be dropped.

“We are talking about corruption, embezzlement, white collar crime, it will damage trust in the justice system and the criminals will be the winners,” he said. “You don’t speed up trials, you truncate them.”

After an outcry from the judges, the original plan was changed to exclude mafia, terrorism and other crimes that carry a life sentence.

Justice Minister Cartabia points out that the reform also provides for the hiring of 15,000 clerks to lighten the workload of judges, boost the digitization of the system, simplify certain procedures and encourage plea bargaining to prevent cases from being brought before the courts.

Cartabia said in May that EU Justice Commissioner Didier Reynders had given the package “a very positive opinion” and that she remained in close contact with him.

EU demands in Italy’s recovery plan, known as “targets and milestones”, spell out requested reductions in the length of trials, but leave it up to Rome to achieve them.

The head of Italy’s lawyers’ lobby, Gian Domenico Caiazza, called the guillotine appeal a “mess” but said it at least prevented cases from going on forever, with unacceptable distress for the accused. He called for stronger incentives for plea bargaining.

“In Italy, 90% of cases end up in court compared to 30% in the United States, which can only clog the system,” he said.

(Gavin Jones reported from Rome, writing by Gavin Jones; editing by Alison Williams)

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