Child Abuse, Frame-Ups and Free Speech
Wu Ming - 28.01.2002 03:50
An Italian tribunal sentenced that a book authored by "Luther Blissett" is to be withdrawn from bookstores and destroyed.
From "La Repubblica", Italian newspaper, December 11th, 2001:
Luther Blissett will have to pay compensation to the public official Lucia Musti and the book *Lasciate che i bimbi* [Let the Children...] must be destroyed. It´s a striking victory obtained by the magistrate that coordinated the investigations into the "Children of Satan" over the collective name signatory to the text. The civil tribunal found in her favor on all fronts, declaring that two chapters "Children of Satan: Anatomy of a Frame Up" and "The Dimitry case is over" of the book edited and published by Castelvecchi and distributed on the internet "are damaging to her reputation". The verdict thus specifies the sentencing of the publishing company to the book?s "withdrawal from commerce and the destruction of the copies present in bookshops or in storage". Should Castelvecchi wish to continue publication, they will have to agree to remove the two incriminating paragraphs. These same paragraphs must also be eliminated from internet sites. Another company, ?Cybercore?, will have to erase from a separate site part of an article that takes up the argument, from the title " The truth is electric, and is distributed, is distributed, is distributed." The convicted company will also have to publish the sentence in several daily newspapers. Musti was granted damages of 80 million lira. Her lawyer Nicola Alessandri, who acted for her together with Guido Magnisi, declared that the principle objective of the action has been accomplished, namely "the demostration of the defamatory content of some of the declarations in the book by Luther Blissett." The lawyer Franco Bambini who defended the signatory of the contract [between Castelvecchi and Luther Blissett], Roberto Bui, insists that the decision will be contested. Bui believes that Musti´s demands have been "unrealistic. The book is present on many other web sites and is ineradicable."
***
From "Il Resto del Carlino" (local right-wing rag in Bologna, where the scandal developed.), same day:
The book registered by Luther Blissett defamed the magistrate Lucia Musti and will be withdrawn from the market. The civil tribunal of bologna has thus decided. The third section of the work titled "Let the children... - Pedophilia as a pretext for a witch hunt", published by Castelvecchi in the October of 1997 and also distributed over the internet by the company ?2008 Communications?. The book, which takes as its starting-point the trial of the sect of Marco Dimitri, the ?Children of Satan, was declared injurious to the image of the Bolognese public official, pages in several chapters specifically described the magistrate as ´intolerant and mentally unstable´, practically ´the armed wing of the Holy Inquisition´ who furthermore had ´a mania for protagonism´. The Tribunal ordered the publisher and other defendants to withdraw the book (which can be republished provided the removal of the incriminatory chapters) and to publish the verdict.
"The principal objective - said the lawyers for the public official, Guido Magnisi and Nicola Alessandri - has been accomplished, as its content, defamatory and damaging to the reputation of Dottoreessa Musti, has been fully demonstrated. As for the compensation (450 million lira was sought) the quantification appears consistent with what is otherwise the trend in the jurisprudence in this area. A trend that unfortunately has not succeeded in finding, as distinct from other countries, parameters adequate to the effective restitution for the damage to the reputation and professionalism, beyond that more broadly moral, that similar episodes generate for each person who is subject to attacks of this type."
[Translations from Italian by the Hydrarchist]
***
The following, clarifying interview with Roberto Bui (a.k.a. Wu Ming 1, formerly a member of the "Luther Blissett Project") was published on January 18th, 2002, on the local leftist magazine *Zero in Condotta*. Questions by Marco Trotta, a well-known human rights hacktivist and animator of the Bologna Social Forum.
[...]
A: Will you tell us about the legal troubles related to the book?
Q: A wide range of literary techniques, including cut-up, were used to write *Lasciate che i bimbi*. The book gives an account of the three year period that turned Europe into a big atrocity show-room, from 1996 to the end of 1998. In those days "pedophilia" was described as the most serious problem in the world. It sounded like "pedophiles" were everywhere, a very powerful clandestine organization, practically the occult masters of the Internet, whose agents were on the prowl in all public spaces of every town. It was an "emergency", indeed, a collective psychosis whose main consequences have been a general retreat from the field of individual liberties: several national parliaments passed laws based on censorship and the authorities destroyed the lives of hundreds of individuals who were mistaken for "monsters", innocent people whose names and faces would suddenly end up in the TV news or in the press below sensational headlines.
In Italy *Lasciate che i bimbi* pioneered counterinformation on such a disturbing issue as child abuse. From then on, alternative investigations have proved that real *abuse* was often committed by the authorities for the alleged purpose of "protecting the children". Even the National Council of Magistrates is investigating the conduct of the notorious Pietro Forno, the deputy district attorney who coordinates the activities of an "anti-pedophilia team" in Milan, after Appeal Courts acquitted virtually every person he had prosecuted!
Since the early days, *Lasciate che i bimbi* was targeted by reactionary lobby groups and individuals who demanded its withdrawal and destruction. In particular, at the beginning of 1998 Ms. Lucia Musti, formerly the public prosecutor in the trial vs. Marco Dimitri and the Children of Satan (whose story is told in the first chapter of the book) announced that the book "caused damages" to her reputation and filed a civil lawsuit. In fact the book exposed all the tricks she pulled, including the ridiculous statements and the shameful exploitation of media sensationalism, things she did in order to depict Dimitri as a monster and keep him rotting in jail.
Musti took legal action against the publisher (Castelvecchi) and two ISPs whose servers hosted free electronic editions of the book (Cybercore Ltd. and 2008 Comunicazione). She asked for a compensation of 450 million lire [232,410 euros], the withdrawal and the destruction of all copies, as well as the removal of the electronic editions from the Net. Oddly enough, her summons compared the "anti-copyright" clause of the book to a "license to kill", because it allegedly encouraged the out-of-control circulation of the book and the multiplication of moral damages.
Later on, Castelvecchi revealed my name to the Tribunal and stated that I was the "author" of the book, although *Lasciate che i bimbi* was a collective work and I had just signed the contract. Therefore my position is bizarre: my opposite party is not Musti, it is my former publisher!
As to the money, the Tribunal´s verdict reappraised Musti´s demands, and sentenced a compensation of 80 million lire [about 41,000 euros]. Castelvecchi has to pay 15,500 euros and *I* (i.e. the collective I represent) was sentenced to give *him* the 50% of the figure *after* he pays. In the meanwhile, Castelvecchi´s firm went bankrupt, Musti has to get in the long queue of creditors, I don´t know what´s going to happen. Of course we´ll impugn the verdict. An interesting thing is that the verdict doesn´t identify me as the author of the book, I was condemned as an "accessory" to the felony committed by Castelvecchi.
Q: Ms. Musti also led the investigations on the "Uno Bianca" fascist killers in the early 1990´s [some Bologna right-wing policemen founded a secret armed group and started to "execute" gypsies and north-african migrants, t.n.]. Recently she indicted 57 demonstrators who took part to the big anti-fascist action of May 13th, 2000 [almost 10,000 people prevented a neo-nazi group called Forza Nuova to hold their national congress in Bologna, t.n.]...
A: Actually the investigations on the "Uno Bianca" fascist gang were coordinated by her colleague Mr. Spinosa, Musti was her right arm. The two fellas went on a false track and indicted the Santagata brothers, petty criminals living in the Pilastro [a destitute working class district in the eastern outskirts of Bologna, t.n.]. Spinosa and Musti kept the Santagatas in "preventive detection" at the Dozza prison even after more serious investigations narrowed the circle around the Savi brothers. They had gotten the wrong brothers! Ghetto 84, a Bologna punk rock band, wrote a song about this story titled "Dozza Prison Blues": "The newspapers nailed you / You´re from the Pilastro, is that a crime? / Voices and screams in the prison lobbies: / "It was the cops, not us!".
As to the 57 indictments, I just want to notice that on May 13th, 20000 thousands of people took the place of the cowardly institutions and enforced our Republic´s Constitutional Act by preventing fascists from holding their congress. The fact that the DA´s office indicted them instead of the dumb nephews of Mussolini may persuade the public opinion that the DA only investigates "leeward", they indict Satanists when the Holy Jubilee is incipient, then they indict antifascists after a right-wing coalition took over Palazzo Chigi [the seat of the national government, t.n.].
Q: The Tribunal sentenced that the book may be republished only if you expunge the two incriminated chapters. What is their content and why did Ms. Musti deemed it as slanderous?
A: The first chapter is titled "Children of Satan: deconstruction of a frame up" and is a summing-up of our counter-inquiry and solidarity campaign. The second one is not even a chapter, it is just a paragraph that was added as an appendix after the Children of Satan were acquitted for the first time. It is titled "The Dimitri case is over". Musti couldn´t deny that the facts we told are true, for the simple reason that during the investigation she was interviewed by the local press at least three times a week and the more she spoke out the more she gave Luther Blissett the rope to (metaphorically) hang her. Given that the facts were not disputable, she clung on to our choice of "incivil" words.
Musti´s summons and the act of defense written by my lawyer Franco Bambini are both available in *Back Pages*, the electronic pamphlet devoted to the court case, which one can download for free at > (only in Italian).
Q: Another decision by the court was the removal of the book from all the websites. Of course in the past four years many things have changed (for worse) in the legislation on the Internet. Do you think that the sentence is enforceable? Is that in contradiction with the freedom of speech granted by the Constitution?
A: I´ll just point out that since 1998 mirror sites of the book proliferated on the Net, which makes the enforcement of the sentence nearly impossible.
Q: What kind of actions are you preparing now?
A: As I told you, we are going to contest the verdict for obvious political and ethical reasons. We have asked political groups and squats to help us organize benefit parties to raise the money for filing the appeal. Civil suits are very expensive.
Q: As you wrote in the book, the Children of Satan indictment roused your interest after you realized it had little to do with justice and the group was "framed". You touched the most sensitive nerves of our society and dealt with such subjects as pedophilia and freedom of worship. Do you think that the book is still useful in the present circumstances?
A: Nowadays more than ever, unfortunately. Two years later the Luther Blissett Project published a fuller-bodied essay titled *Nemici dello Stato: Criminali, "mostri" e leggi speciali nella societa´ di controllo* [Enemies of the State: Criminals, "Monsters" and Special Laws in the Society of Control]. The issues of *Lasciate che i bimbi* were studied and exposed in depth. We put them in the context of a thirty-year repressive trend which turned "emergency" into a real method of government. By "emergency" we mean this sequence: 1) individuation and location of a public enemy; 2) media-driven moral panic; 3) renewal of the legislation. This started in the 1970´s with "terrorism", an emergency which was directly related to the public dimension of law & order, then the process went on emergency by emergency, stirring up moral panic on ever more "individual" issues, "cultural" issues in the narrowest meaning of the adjective, emergencies that were related to biopolitics and the behavioural patterns of single patterns, which marked the passage from the old disciplinary society to the present-day society of control. Mass hysteria on "pedophiles" and "cults" were striking examples of this.
After September 11th we were pushed back to the public emergency of "terrorism", however things have changed since the 1970´s, and the individuation of the "terrorist" scapegoat is more biopolitical, it is the individuation of an "alien" (the muslim, the enemy of western civilization etc.).
***
ENGLISH TRANSLATIONS AVAILABLE:
Introduction to *Let the Children...? (HTML)
"Children of Satan: Deconstruction of a Frame-Up": the incriminated chapter (HTML):
Introduction to *Enemies of the State: Criminals, ?Monsters? and Special Laws in the Society of Control*
(downloadable as rtf + zip file):
(downloadable as pdf + zip file):
***
APPENDIX: IT WAS TWO YEARS AGO TODAY
From *Il Resto del Carlino*, 27 January 2000, pag.9:
THE SECT´S ATROCITIES? NOTHING HAPPENED
Bologna, the "Children of Satan" acquitted in the 2nd degree trial.
Now Dimitri claims for damages.
by Nicoletta Rossi
BOLOGNA - Four years have passed, and nothing had happened. Four years during which journalists and magistrated have poured rivers of ink on paper, four years of the same old TV broadacasts. Four years of controversies. The Children of Satan are innocent. No human sacrifice ever took place. No collective rape. No mysterious potion was given to any victim.
Innocent. After two years and a half, the Appeal Court confirmed the Tribunal´s verdict: the acolytes of Marco Dimitri - founder and leader of the sect that put Bologna within the triangle of magic cities - are not guilty of any of the atrocities they were charged with, i.e. the rape of Elisabetta Dozza (the 15-year-old girl who affiliated with the sect and then repented) and more sexual violence on a 2.5-year-old little boy, plus more improbable atrocities, including hanging around in Bologna on a van carrying the corpse of an old woman, and killing a north-African immigrant and burning his body during a ritual. Not to mention the alleged involvement with the sect of unlikely persons, like a gentleman of noble birth and a Budrio-based famous businessman.
Acquitted, for "the facts did not happen". The defendants were Marco Dimitri, his "right arm" Piergiorgio Bonora (a young man who now has quitted the group, got married and is about to become a father), and their former acolytes Cristina Bagnolina, Emanuela Ferrari and Damiano Berto. The "repentant"´s former boy-friend Rino Luongo was acquitted as well.
Yesterday afternoon, while awaiting the verdict, Luongo kept repeating: "Elisabetta´s lies were due to the fact that I´d left her, and she wanted to take vengeance".
Two women have been the gowned protagonists of the affair. Early on, the public prosecutor Lucia Musti, who was certain that the sect was dangerous. Later, during the appeal trial, the general prosecutor Eleonora De Marco, who asked that the defendants be acquitted [...]
Marco Dimitri, probably because he´s got nothing else to do [1], and Rino Luongo, who works as a warehouseman, did not miss a hearing, as if they were the most loyal citizens. "This is a defeat for those who depicted me as a monster", commented Dimitri after the new acquittal [2]. And the lawyers who have defended the sect (Nicola Chirco, Guido Clausi Schettini, Roberto Bellogi and Carla Mei) have announced a claim for damages on the ground of wrong detention, for Dimitri, Bonora and Luogo stayed in jail for a year.[3]
[Box:]
NOW THE ACCUSER IS A PORN STAR
Elisabetta Dozza, who told stories of rape and murder
BOLOGNA - She was the great accuser of the Satanists. Now she´s come of age and works as a model. Well, not exactly: she´s a softcore porn actress [4], and her past in the sect is an inspiration for their performances: skulls, black palls and all the usual satanic kitsch. She appears on specialized magazines, and has acted in a movie.
When Elisabetta Dozza started to talk about satanic rituals with the Carabinieri, it was november ´95 and she was fifteen, chubby and unsightly.
Two years later, when she showed up at the first hearing of the trial, the ugly duckling had turned into a skinny, trendy 18-year-old. She knew she was the star.
Elisabetta did not live in a happy family, maybe she took the opportunity: the more she told, the more she would get. [The DA office] moved her to a new house, and she spent a summer in London, studying English, a vacation that a girl of her class could never afford.
Elisabetta went too far, mixing true and false month by month, until she invalidated a tale that had some credibility in the beginning. She was spoiled [by the DA office], this is the position of general prosecutor De Marco. It may be the truth. (Ni.Ro.)
Footnotes by Wu Ming 1, January 27th, 2000:
1. Dimitri´s got nothing else to do because he can´t get no fucking job. The Carlino has exploited him as the perfect front-page news bogeyman and destroyed his life.
2. I was there myself, and Dimitri said: "This is a defeat for the Carlino".
3. During that year, the Carlino interviewed Lucia Musti at least a dozen times, describing her as a new Joan of Arc fighting for faith.
4. This isn´t quite correct, ´cause she´s a *hard*-core porn actress. Here´s the blurb of one of the two movies she worked in ("Bologna: XXX Satan vol.2"): "During a short interval in her judiciary testimonies, the super-witness against the Bologna satanists gives fantastic blow jobs and gets breath-takingly fucked in the ass". From tragedy to farce, and this is no moralistic remark: the mythomaniac who´d become a family-value, hearth´n´home heroine, was exploited by the DA office vampires, then they discarded her when she became useless (i.e. after the first acquittal). Now she makes a living out of her former spectacular role. Soon, people will understand that she´s a victim herself. Back to tragedy.
 E-Mail: giap@wumingfoundation.com  Website: http://www.wumingfoundation.com
|
