Emiliano’s former chief of staff convicted of illegal financing. Absolved the governor

“I hope the circuit of the mud machine against Emiliano is interrupted, who for five long years, albeit never complaining, endured everything and more for an affair for which he has now clarified also in the process that he has no of responsibility”: the lawyer of the governor of Puglia, Gaetano Sassanelli, after the acquittal sanctioned by the Court of Turin, attacked the justicialist vulgate that accompanied the investigation and the trial for illegal financing – at the time of the 2017 Pd primaries won by Matteo Renzi – in which he stumbled Michele Emiliano.

The prosecutor had asked for a one-year prison sentence for the dem politician, judge Alessandra Salvadori pronounced an acquittal because “He did not commit the crime”. After reading the device, the reasons will be filed in ninety days. On the other hand, the procedural affair that concerned the Piedmontese proceeding did not have the same outcome Claudius StefanazziSalento lawyer, former Emiliano’s chief of staff, now adviser to the emir and deputy of the Democratic Party: for him a four-month sentence together with the entrepreneur Vito Ladisa plus a fine of 20 thousand euros, subject to recognition of the extenuating circumstances.

The entrepreneur was also acquitted James Messia (called into question for a payment of about 24,000 euros to Eggers, the Turin company that handled Emiliano’s electoral campaign) and Stefanazzi himself for another charge. A supplementary investigation into other people possibly involved in the affair of the illicit financing is envisaged. “As is a must in Italy – commented Emiliano’s lawyer, Gaetano Sassanelli – no one will answer for these years of poisoned information, despite the fact that life, relationships, affections and the entire existence have turned inside out of the president”. The lawyer is fierce against those who started the investigation with an anonymous complaint: “Evidently it was thought that the squalid and unconstitutional instrument of the anonymous could be used to undermine the image of the governor”.

The deputy dem Claudio Stefanazzi, having learned “with consternation and surprise of the decision of the Court of Turin”, announced that he “was waiving the prescriptionwhich would take place in about a year, in order for absolute extraneousness to the facts contested up to the Supreme Court of Cassation to prevail, amply documented extraneousness”.

The acquittal for Big Mike comes at a crucial moment in his political career, at the end of the second term in the region (in 2025). At the moment the ballot is underway with the mayor of Bari Antonio Decaro for a possible candidacy in the Pd lists at the next European elections, in 2024.