Italy fury as tycoon's asbestos deaths conviction quashed

Prime Minister Matteo Renzi vowed Thursday to change Italy's "nightmare" statute of limitation rules after the conviction of a Swiss billionaire related to nearly 3,000 asbestos deaths was overturned. In a ruling greeted with fury by relatives of the victims, the Court of Cassation on Wednesday quashed the conviction and 18-year prison sentence given to tycoon Stephan Schmidheiny over inadequate safety provisions in asbestos-cement plants run by his now defunct group Eternit in Italy in the 1970s and 80s.
"If an episode like Eternit is not a crime or if it is a crime and subject to prescription then we have to change the rules of the game," Renzi said. "We cannot have this nightmare of prescription. The demand for justice does not diminish with time. There is some pain that cannot be healed by time." Leaders of both houses in the Italian parliament said they would ensure a reform demanded by magistrates for years was quickly enacted.
The court ruled that Schmidheiny, a scion of a Swiss industrial dynasty now regarded as a philanthropist, should not have been convicted of causing a health or environmental catastrophe because the verdict came more than 12 years after the crime and was therefore subject to the statute of limitation applicable to the specific charges. Raffaele Guariniello, the Turin prosecutor in charge of the case, said he would seek to have Schmidheiny retried for homicide.
"The Court of Cassation did not conclude in favour of absolution," he said. "The crime was committed, and it was committed with intent. "We will not throw in the towel." Three separate homicide cases have been opened in Turin, one related to Italian deaths from mesothelioma, a form of lung cancer, one related to the deaths of ex-workers at an asbestos mine near Turin and one into the deaths of Italians who worked in Eternit plants in Switzerland and Brazil.
In the first of the three cases, prosecutors are said to be closing to tabling formal charges of homicide charges with aggravating circumstances of abject motives (profit) and insidious means (asbestos). This case relates to victims from the Piedmont towns of Casale Monferrato and Cavagnolo where Eternit had production centres. In Casale Monferrato, a town of 36,000 people, 50-60 people are currently dying prematurely every year from asbestos related disease, according to local health authorities.