Ossigeno has identified 14 other threats

4 February 2019

Those targeted include the journalists Marco Benanti, Enzo Basso and Graziella Lombardo (Sicily), Paolo Borrometi (Lazio), Gianni Galeotti and his companion (Emilia Romagna) Giampiero De Luca (3 instances ) (Campania), Luca Pagni, Enrico Currò, Carlo Festa and Tobia de Stefano (Lombardy) and Gabriele Cocchi (Liguria)

From the 1st January 2019 Ossigeno has ascertained and documented 29 unjustifiable attacks of the same type.

“Ossigeno per l’Informazione ” maintains that the episodes described below represent unjustifiable violations of freedom of expression and of the press. The fifteen directly affected journalists were added to the List of Victims of Unjustifiable Attacks.

LAZIO – Paolo Borrometi

On the 22nd January 2019, in Rome, the journalist Paolo Borrometi received a letter containing death threats and immediately reported the matter to the Carabinieri. The anonymous message, written in Sicilian dialect, reads: “Picca nai”, that is to say, “you have little time left”. It was composed with characters cut out from newspaper headlines. It had been delivered to the Rome editorial staff of TV 2000 with which Borrometi collaborates.

Learn more about it on the ossigeno.info website

SICILY – Marco Benanti, Enzo Basso and Graziella Lombardo

The publisher of the weekly Centonove, Enzo Basso, the journalist Graziella Lombardo, former chief editor of the same newspaper and the journalist Marco Benanti, chief editor of the online journal Iene Sicule, have been admitted as civil parties in the trial in Caltanissetta against the former president of Confindustria Sicilia, Antonello Montante.

An activity of gathering potentially blackmailing dossiers was allegedly conducted similar to that against journalists Gianpiero Casagni (Centonove) and Attilio Bolzoni (La Repubblica).

Learn more on the story on ossigeno.info

EMILIA ROMAGNA – Gianni Galeotti and his companion

On the 4th January2019 in Modena, in viale Gramsci, the journalist Gianni Galeotti, the correspondent of the web journals TvQui and La Pressa, was insulted and targeted by a group of people who threw stones at him whilst he was filming in the neighbourhood in order to document the fences installed by the local inhabitants to defend themselves from the intrusive presence of drug dealers.

Learn more on ossigeno.info

CAMPANIA – Giampiero De Luca

On the 11th January 2019, in Naples, unknown individuals smeared with excrement the lock of the external door of the tobacconists’ shop of the father of the journalist Giampiero De Luca, collaborator of La Stampa.it and of TV Luna. It is not the first time that De Luca receives threats for his journalism activity. The first threats came in July 2018 when he found in the mailbox in his apartment building a note with the words: “You won’t live long” and even earlier, in November 2018, when unknown individuals had pierced the tyres of his car. Moreover, two months before that, in September 2018, while walking, two men on a scooter had shouted at him: “You’re causing trouble”.

Learn more on the ossigeno.info website

LOMBARDIA – Luca Pagni, Enrico Currò, Carlo Festa and Tobia de Stefano

From the 19th February to the 2nd March 2018 the reporters Enrico Currò and Luca Pagni of La Repubblica, Carlo Festa of Il Sole 24 Ore and Tobia De Stefano of Libero were shadowed on behalf of the former managing director of the Milan football club, Marco Fassone. The manager wanted to find out who had informed the reporters about the financial difficulties, the corporate structure and the future of the Milan club.

Learn more on the ossigeno.info website

LIGURIA – Gabriele Cocchi

On the 17th January 2019 the lawsuit for defamation against the journalist de la Gazzettadellaspezia.it, Gabriele Cocchi, was dismissed by the Court of La Spezia. The reporter was sued on October 11th , 2016 by Renato Goretta, interim managing director ATC (the municipal transport company of La Spezia) for having reported, in two articles published in the online newspaper in July 2016, the punitive attitude of the company against those of its employees who reported pathological effects attributable to asbestos exposure. At the time the analyses of the local health agench,ASL, revealed the presence of asbestos in the workplace in documents not disclosed by the company.

Ossigeno’s Legal Aid service assisted in the legal procedures of the Cocchi affair . In January 2019 the name of the journalist was included among the victims of intimidation.

Learn more on the ossigeno.info website

(wt)