The repercussions of the Cartabia gag on the news. The prosecutor investigating the sailing ship: “Reporters hindered”. In Padua, silence for months on a femicide

Can the news of a femicide remain unknown for a year? And can a chief prosecutor feel muzzled by a state law? The answer to both questions is yes. Two different stories, one of alleged domestic violence that ended in a crime, the other an accident, that are united by the controversial Cartabia law. A gag that hinders the work of journalists and has even allowed 13 prosecutors’ offices to be monitored for possible violations.

Union and order of journalists – at the time – they gave up on being heard. And in these days they have arrived first the protests for the “armouring” by the Termini Imerese prosecutor’s office for the story – told by the media all over the world – of the sailing ship Bayesian, and today comes the note from the Order of Journalists of Veneto on the methods that led to the officialisation – one year after the facts – of the news of the femicide in Abano Terme, of which 37-year-old Nicoletta Rotaru was the victim. The victim’s husband was arrested in March and the man has already been sent for trial. A gap of five months on a topic like femicide that continues to cause social alarm and that cannot be silenced by the presumption of innocence that is perfectly guaranteed by the professional ethics of journalists.

The note of the regional order – “It is surprising – says President Giuliano Gargano – that the news comes out after such a long time and without an official communication from the Prosecutor’s Office. In the past we have already reported an overly restrictive reading of the Cartabia law. It is necessary to return to an open and frank professional relationship between prosecutors and journalists”. Gargano announces that he will bring the matter before the Council of the Order of Veneto. “The Corriere del Veneto on newsstands today – Gargano reconstructs – opens with the news (then taken up online by other newspapers) of the femicide of Nicoleta Rotaru, in Abano Terme. Crime committed a year ago, on August 2, 2023 and initially classified as suicide. The investigations led to another conclusion and the husband was arrested, in March of this year, on charges of aggravated homicide. Without prejudice to the sacrosanct respect for the presumption of innocence – concludes the president of the Veneto Odg -, it is equally importantthe right to inform citizensstarting from the concept of public interest also recalled by the law. The increase in reports or calls to the anti-violence number 1522 demonstrate that we cannot remain silent about feminicides”.

The outburst of the prosecutor Ambrogio Cartosio – At the same time, the law that bears the name of the former Minister of Justice Marta Cartabia has been harshly criticized by the chief prosecutor of Termini Imerese which he has effectively argued creates obstacles to free information. The magistrates opened their press conference on the sinking of the sailboat with reference to the impossibility of the investigators to talk about ongoing investigations by citing decree 106 of 2006 which in article 5 specifies the relationships of the prosecutors with the media. The decree (Silvio Berlusconi Prime Minister and Roberto Castelli Minister of Justice) was then modified with decree 188 of November 2021 by Minister Cartabia the so-called “gag rule”.

The prosecutor almost apologized, “hoping there is understanding” about the silence of the investigators from August 19, when the sailing ship sank, to today when he called a press conference at the prosecutor’s office. “In these days I have entrenched myself in silence, I have not answered the questions asked by journalists, but I did it simply because it is right that people know that in Italy it is not allowed to do otherwisebecause the 2006 decree prohibits the public prosecutor from making statements except on special occasions. Only the press release and the press conference can be used”.

The journalists’ protest – THE’Sicilian Press Association had taken a stand saying that “in all the newspapers of the world dozens of colleagues write about the shipwreck that occurred in the Porticello sea. Faced with a succession of news of exceptional public interest, however, the source that according to Italian law should have informed the public opinion remained silent”. For Assostampa “it was a situation “that not only puts journalists who work in the field in great difficulty but that deprives public opinion of important parts of the story of an event of global importance”.

The prosecutor himself admitted that it was a “a very serious tragedy, an event that, due to the calibre of the people involved, has had an international and global impact”. After the union, the Order of Journalists also intervened, underlining that “journalists from all over the world who are dealing with the sinking of the Bayesian have to deal with the lack of evidence and with the absence of institutional interlocutors“. Cartosio, asking for understanding, explained that “the law creates significant obstacles to the activity of free information, but I believe that all citizens, including magistrates, are required to respect the laws even when they don’t like them, that’s why I couldn’t say anything”.

The absurd cases produced by the law – The law has produced cases bordering on the absurd, such as when in March 2023 the Bergamo prosecutor’s office announced the closure of the investigation into the management of the pandemic with a 21-line note without names and without crimes. A delicate and very important investigation on which the journalists had to struggle to understand who the people registered were and for what crimes with respect to protests that involved thousands of deaths.

A sensational case but one that nowadays concerns news of public importance even if investigations of this magnitude and so it happens that the alleged murderers – perhaps arrested on a precautionary custody order – remain nameless, like the victims of accidents at work or the names of places closed because they do not respect health and hygiene standards. There are also the journalists denounced like the journalist who reported the results of an autopsy of a dead woman-