Genoa, Italy - An Italian court handed down sentences
Thursday in Genoa against 13 police officers accused of violence
against protestors at the 2001 Group of Eight summit in the city but
acquitted several high-ranking officers in the case.
Shouts of 'shame, shame!' from many of those in the courtroom's
public gallery accompanied the late evening reading of the verdicts
and sentences, which came after some 11 hours of deliberations by
judges.
Among those attending the evening court session were people who
were beaten when police raided a school that was being used as a
headquarters by anti-globalization groups during the G8.
Prosecutors had asked for a combined total of more than 100 years
of jail for the 29 defendants, many of whom had been indicted on
charges of assault and causing grievous bodily harm related to the
raid at the Diaz school.
Judges acquitted 16 of the defendants, including three who
currently serve as top police and security officials in Italy.
The remaining 13 defendants received jail sentences amounting to a
combined total of 35 years and fines related to the repayment of
damages caused to protestors.
The 2001 G8 summit in the north-western Italian port city
triggered some of the most violent protests that have often
accompanied meetings of the so-called 'club of rich nations.' One
protestor was killed during the street clashes around the three-day
meeting.
Scores of demonstrators, some of whom had travelled from other
countries, were injured during the raid at the school on the night of
July 21-22, 2001. More than 60 people were treated in hospital.
Authorities at the time said they believed the school was being
used to store weapons used by a violent fringe of protestors who
engaged in street battles with police.
Following the raid, police produced several poles and two Molotov
cocktail petrol bombs, which they said had been seized from the
school. A subsequent investigation proved the allegations false,
along with claims that protestors who were sleeping at the time of
the raid reacted violently against police.
In a separate trial in July, a Genoa court handed out jail
sentences for brutality to 15 police and prison officials blamed for
excessive violence against summit protestors.
Those charges mostly stemmed from the beatings suffered by scores
of anti-globalization protesters while they were detained in a
barracks.
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