Lawsuits: Macerata. Cronache Maceratesi wins another battle

The Court rejected a request for € 400,000 in damages for alleged defamation. It is the twentieth victory in twelve years, recalls the editorial staff.

On January 14^th 2020, the Civil Court of Macerata rejected the claim for damages of 400,000 euro for defamation in print against Cronache Maceratesi and the lawyer Giuseppe Bommarito, a collaborator of the online newspaper. Bommarito, well-known appeals lawyer from Macerata with a passion for journalism and writing, author of several essays and, in the past, a collaborator with the “Resto del Carlino” from his city. He was defended by the lawyers Stefania Cinzia Maroni and Vando Scheggia and the Cronache Maceratesi by the lawyers Francesca Marchesini and Marialetizia Ciccarelli.

The compensation was requested in 2018 by the entrepreneur Giulia Lucarelli (administrator of the Edisasfalti company) and her husband Maurizio Zeppa. The judge ruled that they will have to pay legal expenses of € 6,000 to each defendant plus out-of-pocket expenses.

The summons for damages (200,000 euro asked from the newspaper and 200,000 from Bommarito) had been presented in relation to an article published in 2017, in which Giuseppe Bommarito had reconstructed the relationship between Lucarelli and Zeppa and the well-known Sicilian businessman Alfio Caccamo, owner of the Corridomnia shopping centre, who ended up in an investigation for an alleged money-laundering activity.

The disputed article, entitled “Money-laundering, an anti-Mafia investigation into Alfio Caccamo’s affairs”, highlighted Alfio Caccamo’s close relationship with Maurizio Zeppa and Giulia Lucarelli, stating that Caccamo and Zeppa were both members of the Voghera Est shopping centre. The writer Giuseppe Bommarito also pointed out that Maurizio Zeppa was special representative of the Edilasfalti company, managed by his wife. Bommarito also recalled that the Caccamo company was expanding in the Camerino area where, at the time, Giulia Lucarelli’s brother was the city councillor for town planning and deputy mayor.

THE JUDGMENT – All the circumstances indicated in that article, according to the judge, are “objective and uncontested”. He wrote in his judgement, “That text describes in a detailed and rigorous manner the elements of contact between Caccamo and them” and “is not characterized by an underhand style as it provides for the listing of factual data that describe objective data”.

THE REACTIONS– Andrea Bommarito told Ossigeno for information: “My articles rankle because they are verified, with names and surnames, and address the issues on its merits. I have been collaborating with Cronache Maceratesi for years and I have already received 7 or 8 lawsuits, all dismissed. The only one still in progress is that from the mayor of Macerata, Romano Carancini, the unique case of a mayor who sues a private citizen “.

THE EDITORIAL of Cronache Maceratesi in an article of the 30^th January 2020 expressed satisfaction, recalling that this “is the latest episode in a series of dismissals and acquittals (twenty in 12 years) by those who sued the newspaper in the figure of the chief editor Matteo Zallocco for the investigations, written in most cases by the lawyer Bommarito, often discomforting and on burning issues, but always carried out through a study of the documents “.

collaborated Andrea De Tommasi (wt)