Cesare Battisti (1954-)

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Cesare Battisti (born 18 December 1954) is an Italian author of thrillers, and a former member of the autonomist Armed Proletarians for Communism (Proletari Armati per il Comunismo - PAC), a far left group which supported armed struggle during Italy's "anni di piombo" ("Years of Lead"). He was condemned for committing several murders in Italy, but he has always denied them. After having left behind armed struggle and fled, as several others Italian suspected activists, to France, protected by the "Mitterrand doctrine", Cesare Battisti became the author of several novels, including the semi-autobiographical book, The Last Bullets. After the de facto repeal of the Mitterrand doctrine in 2002, he fled France to avoid possible extradition. He was arrested in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on 18 March 2007 by Brazilian and French police.

Contents 1 Youth and PAC membership 2 Sentences and flight 3 A diplomatic dispute between France and Italy 4 The "Battisti affair" 5 DSSA's attempt to kidnap Battisti ? 6 Endnotes 7 Bibliography 8 External links

[edit] Youth and PAC membership

Cesare Battisti was born in 1954 at Sermoneta, near Latina. He left the classical lyceum he was attending to in 1971, engaged in petty crime, and then moved on to more serious offenses. Between 1974 and 1976 he was arrested for theft and bank robberies ("expropriations"), and sentenced to prison.

In 1976 he moved to Milan, and became a member of the PAC, an autonomist Marxist group which conducted armed struggle, and which had a "horizontal," decentralized structure, opposed to the centralist organisation of the Red Brigades (BR). The organisation, which counted approximatively 60 members, had its roots in a district of the south of Milan, called Barona. Four assassinations have been claimed by the PAC: Antonio Santoro, a prison surveillant accused by the PAC of mistreatments on prisoners (on June 6, 1978 in Udine), jeweler Pierluigi Torregiani (on February 16, 1979 in Milan), Lino Sabadin, a butcher and perhaps supporter of the neo-fascist Italian Social Movement (MSI) (the same day and nearly the same hour, near Mestre), and DIGOS agent Andrea Campagna, who had participated in the first arrestations concerning the Torregiani case (on April 19, 1979 in Milan). The PAC also engaged in several robberies, in the tradition of propaganda of the deed.

It is believed that the murder of Torreggiani and Sabbadin have been decided because both of them had killed a robber in the past, thus as an act of armed opposition to vigilante justice. Torreggiani was killed in front of his 13 years old son, who was shot as well. The son survived and is now paraplegic. The matter of who shot Torreggiani's son is still debated: the media reported the he was shot by the attackers, some sources, including writer Valerio Evangelisti, state that he was shot by his father in a tragic error.^[1]

Cesare Battisti has stated in several texts that he abandoned armed struggle after Prime Minister Aldo Moro's kidnapping and subsequent murder in May 1978, carried out by the Second Red Brigades lead by Mario Moretti. Moro's case still haunts today's Italy, and the choice of him as target of the Red Brigades was met by incomprehension in several circles of the Italian extra-parliamentary left, in particular by Alberto Franceschini, founder of the BR emprisonned at the time.^[2]

[edit] Sentences and flight

Cesare Battisti was arrested and jailed in Italy on February 26, 1979, sentenced to 12 years and a half of prison for minors crimes. He was condemned, without material evidence, on the grounds of testimonies provided by two pentiti ("repented"), who benefitted from lighter condemnations for their accusations ^[3]. The status of pentito was established by anti-terrorist legislation enacted during this period.

PAC members organised his evasion on October 4, 1981, while he was in Frosinone's prison in Rome. Battisti escaped to Paris, but left for Puerto Escondido, Mexico, very shortly afterwards. While in Mexico, he founded a literary review Via Libre, which is still active nowadays,^[4] and met Subcomandante Marcos. He also participated to the creation of the Book Festival of Managua (Nicaragua) and organised the first Graphic Arts Biennal in Mexico. Cesare Battisti began to write under the impulsion of Paco Ignacio Taibo II, and collaborated to various newspapers.

Pietro Mutti, one of the leader of the PAC who had been condemned in absentia for Santoro's assassination (the prison surveillant), was arrested in 1982. Turned a pentito, his testimony, which helped him reduce his sentence, implicated Battisti, and an alleged complice of him, in the four assassinations claimed by the PAC. His trial was thus reopened in 1987, and he was condemned in absentia in 1988 for two assassinations (Santoro and DIGOS agent Campagna) and complicity of murder in two others (jeweler Torregiani and butcher Sabbadin, assassinated the same day in two different towns). The court definitively condemned him to a life-sentence in 1995. Two years before, the Court of Cassation innocented Battisti's alleged complice, accused by Pietro Mutti.^[1]

Ten years earlier, French socialist president François Mitterrand gave his word that leftist Italian activists whom had broken with their past and the spiral of violence would not be extradited to Italy; this became known as the "Mitterrand doctrine". Many of the extra-parliamentary left-wing Italian activists had fled away to France during the years of lead — while many neofascists, such as Vincenzo Vinciguerra, escaped to Franquist Spain. Trusting in this engagement, Battisti returned to France in 1990, where was arrested on Italy's request in 1991, when the sentence was confirmed in the Court of Cassation. He thus passed five months in Fresnes prison, before being freed after reject of the extradition request by the Paris Appeal Court on May 29, 1991. French justice pleaded that the anti-terrorist legislation enacted in Italy during the "years of lead" "went against the French conception of law," which, along with the European Court of Human Rights, prohibited in particular to extradite a person condemned in absentia if that person was denied the right to a new trial ^[3].

After his liberation, Battisti lived in Paris, where he wrote his first novel, Les Habits d'ombre ("Shadow clothes"). Two thrillers, L'Ombre rouge ("Red shadow") and Buena onda, took as scene the Parisian world of exiled Italians. Another major novel, titled Dernières cartouches ("Last bullets"), takes place in Italy during the "years of lead".

In 1997, among other former left-wing activists which had fled to France, he asked for an amnesty for their crimes to Italy's President of the time, Oscar Luigi Scalfaro (DC). The request was denied. Ovidio Bompressi, former member of Lotta Continua condemned (along with Adriano Sofri and Giorgio Pietrostefani) for killing police officer Luigi Calabresi in 1972, has been one of the rare left-wing activist to be graced by the President, Giorgio Napolitano (Democrats of the Left, DS), in May 2006 because of health reasons.

[edit] A diplomatic dispute between France and Italy

Over the years, Italy asked several times to France to arrest and extradite the refugees. On September 11, 2002 Battisti was again requested for extradition - among others - during the meeting in Paris between Italy's Minister of Justice Roberto Castelli (Northern League) and France's Minister Dominique Perben (RPR).

On February 10, 2004, under Jacques Chirac's presidency, the French government had him arrested on Italy's request and was planning to extradite him to Italy. On June 30, 2004, the Paris Court of Appeal gave a favorable advise for his extradition. A recourse against it is deposed to the Court of Cassation against this positive counsel, and another recourse deposed before the Conseil d'État against the extradition decree. President Jacques Chirac stated on July 2, 2004 that he would not oppose himself to the French justice's decision to extradite him. Justice Minister Dominique Perben confirmed Paris' new position: "There is no ambiguity. There has been a change of attitude from France, and I assume it," (in reference to the "Mitterrand doctrine"), among other reasons "because of the European construction."^[5].^[6]

As of 2007, Paolo Persichetti, former member of the Unità Comuniste Combattenti, has been the only one of the 200 formers activists wanted by Italy, to be extradited to the transalpine state (in August 2002), where he has been condemned to 22 years of prison. Conservative minister Edouard Balladur had signed Persischetti's extradition decree in 1994, which was validated by the Conseil d'Etat the following year.^[6] According to RFI radio station, the Perben-Castelli agreement was to be divided in three parts: all events before 1982 would be prescribed "except in case of exceptionnal gravity"; facts between 1982 and 1993 would be "examined on a case by case basis", in function of the European Convention of Human Rights principle and of the "conditions in which the trials took place in Italy." Finally, events after 1993 would be subjected to the European Arrest Warrant, effective since 1994^{[citation needed]}.

Still claiming his innocence, Cesare Battisti then failed to check in at the local police station, while on parole, on August 21, 2004 and entered again, twenty years later, clandestinity. On October 13, 2005, the Cassation Court upheld the Paris Court of Appeal's judgment, as did the Conseil d'Etat on March 18, 2005. On 18th March 2007 Battisti has been arrested in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

[edit] The "Battisti affair"

As of 2007, Cesare Battisti denies having carried out any of the murders he has been sentenced for.

Defenders of Battisti, among whom the Human Rights League (LDH), consider that France's decision to extradite Battisti was illegal, since Battisti would not have the right to a new trial, after having been judged "in absentia".

The European Court of Human rights, in its december 2006 decision rejecting Battisti's claim that France's extradition decision was illegitimate (Sub art. 6, "claims inadmissible" : Life sentence following a conviction in absentia (Battisti v. France. The Court considered (Information note n. 92) [1] that

"The applicant had patently been informed of the accusation against him and of the progress of the proceedings before the Italian courts, notwithstanding the fact that he had absconded. Furthermore, the applicant, who had deliberately chosen to remain on the run after escaping from prison, had received effective assistance during the proceedings from several lawyers specially appointed by him. Hence, the Italian and subsequently the French authorities had been entitled to conclude that the applicant had unequivocally waived his right to appear and be tried in person. The French authorities had therefore taken due account of all the circumstances of the case and of the Court’s case-law in granting the extradition request made by the Italian authorities: manifestly ill-founded."

The circumstances of his condemnation have been questionned. In particular, French writers Fred Vargas, Valerio Evangelisti and Bernard-Henri Lévy considered that the trial was marked by irregularities, in particular the use of torture, and the misuse of witnesses (cited witnesses were either affected by mental troubles, or were pentito, that is testifying against others in order to benefit from a sentence reduction). Furthermore, they claim that no material proof incriminate Battisti, including ballistic analysis^[7][1][8]

Most of public opinion in Italy, however, disagrees with those views, and Battisti's arrest in Brazil has been commented upon favourably in the media. Rifondazione Comunista, however, has stated that he should not be extradited as he would not be granted the right to a new trial. In France, supporters of Battisti, such as Gilles Perrault, have called this arrest, a few weeks before the April 2007 presidential election, an "electoral feat," closely timed by the Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy, candidate for the UMP conservative party. François Bayrou, candidate for the UDF right-of-center party, has called for a new trial, as well as members of the left-wing, including Ségolène Royal, candidate for the Socialist Party ^[3].

[edit] DSSA's attempt to kidnap Battisti ?

In July 2005, the Italian press revealed the existence of the Department of Anti-terrorism Strategic Studies (DSSA), a "parallel police" created by Gaetano Saya, leader of Destra Nazionale neofascist party, and Riccardo Sindoca, two leaders of the National Union of the Police Forces (Unpf). Both claimed they were former members of Gladio, NATO's "stay-behind" paramilitary organizations involved in Italy's strategy of tension and various terrorist acts. According to judicial sources, Il Messaggero, quoted by The Independent, declared that wiretaps suggested DSSA members had been planning to kidnap Cesare Battisti.^[9]

[edit] Endnotes

[edit] Bibliography

• Travestito da uomo, Granata Press, Bologna, 1993 (Les habits d'ombre, Gallimard, Paris, 1993)
• Nouvel an, nouvelle vie, Ed. Mille et une nuit, Paris,1994
• L'orma rossa, Einaudi, 1999 (L'ombre rouge, Gallimard, Paris, 1995)
• Buena onda, Gallimard, Paris, 1996
• Copier coller, Flammarion, Parigi, 1997. Romanzo per ragazzi
• J'auri ta Pau, Balene, Parigi, 1997 (in "Le Poulpe" thriller serie)
• L'ultimo sparo, Derive-Approdi, Rome, 1998 (Dernières cartouches, Joelle Losfeld, Paris, 1998)
• Naples, Eden Production, Parigi, 1999. Raccolta di cinque racconti di Cesare Battisti, Jean-Jacques Busino, Carlo Lucarelli, Jean-Bernard Pouy and Tito Topin
• Jamais plus sans fusil, du Masque, Paris, 2000
• Terres brûlées, (curatore), Rivages, Paris, 2000
• Avenida Revolución, Nuovi Mondi Media, Ozzano nell'Emilia, 2003 (Avenida Revolución, Rivages, Paris, 2001)
• Le Cargo sentimental, Joelle Losfeld, Paris, 2003
• Vittoria, Eden Production, Paris, 2003
• L'eau du diamant, du Masque, Paris, 2006
• Ma cavale, Grasset/Rivages, Paris, 2006 (with a preface from Bernard-Henri Levy and a postface from Fred Vargas)

[edit] External links

• The website of Battisti's review, Via Libre (French)
• Audio interview of Battisti, by Isabelle Sommier, February 11, 2004, France Inter on Daniel Mermet's show (French)