Brandizzo massacre: preliminary hearing begins for 21 defendants and three companies

The proceeding for the workplace massacre in Brandizzo, in the Turin area, opens today at the Ivrea court, with the preliminary hearing, in which five workers of Sigifer, a subcontractor of RFI, died on the night between 30 and 31 August 2023. The investigations, which took place over three years, led the Piedmont prosecutor's office to request the indictment of the companies RFI, Sigifer and CLF and of 21 people, including business and corporate executives. Among these is Giampiero Strisciuglio, former CEO of RFI and now CEO of the Fs Italiane Group. The hypothesized charges, for various reasons, are multiple manslaughter and negligent train disaster, in addition to charges related to workplace safety legislation.

What happened

Kevin Laganà, 22 years old, Michael Zanera (34), Giuseppe Sorvillo (43), Saverio Giuseppe Lombardo (53), and Giuseppe Aversa (49), workers of the Sigiferr company, were hit and killed by a train (without passengers) while they were preparing to carry out maintenance work on the tracks. The team had to intervene on the tracks near the station: shortly before midnight the workers were already on the line when a convoy arrived and killed them.

The accusations

According to the prosecutor's thesis, the tragedy could not be traced back only to what happened in the minutes before the arrival of the train, but to a wider chain of alleged omissions and deficiencies in prevention, coordination, supervision and training. According to the accusation, that night the workers were allowed onto the tracks when train traffic had not yet been formally interrupted. Before the preliminary hearing judge Mauro Cantone, the accusation will be supported by prosecutors Valentina Bossi and Giulia Nicodemi, coordinated by the prosecutor Gabriella Viglione. To celebrate the hearing, an audio and video connection will be set up in two classrooms of the building.

The civil parties

The constitutions of the civil parties will also be discussed in the preliminary hearing. The Municipality of Brandizzo and the Sicurezza e Lavoro association have already announced their presence in the proceedings. Fillea and Filt Cgil will also join as civil parties. Yesterday the Uil joined: the procedure will be activated today, in the name of the general secretary of the Organization himself. The mandate was entrusted to the lawyer Roberto De Vita, whose law firm has already carried out, for the confederation of via Lucullo, in-depth research on the relationship between the administration of justice and the issue of health and safety in the workplace.

The obstacles

The process so far has been an obstacle course. The Ivrea prosecutor's office had to carry out the investigations, which were already quite complex in themselves, given the chronic shortage of personnel and resources. The courthouse does not have adequate space for so many accused and injured people. The size of the file (12 folders plus 2 interceptions) also caused problems. To allow the parties to acquire the copies in digital format, the prosecutor's office asked for help from some IT experts, but even so the quantity of data was 84 terabytes: too many for the normal flash drives on the market. Lawyers who turned to companies in the sector to obtain a suitable device were told that the cost ranged from 14 thousand to 24 thousand euros. Some have given up.