Italy. Why I sued a convicted Mafia gangster. Journalist Giuseppe Tallino thanks Ossigeno

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The journalist: I feels the need to re-establish a line of dignity and respect, a boundary, when someone has crossed it

The Legal Aid Desk of Ossigeno, which works in collaboration with Media Defence, has awarded the journalist Giuseppe Tallino a financial contribution to cover the costs of the trial that arose from his defamation lawsuit  against the mafioso Augusto La Torre, who had insulted him (read the details here/). In the account below, the journalist describes his reactions  and why he felt the need to respond with legal action.

OSSIGENO November 5^th, 2024 – by Giuseppe Tallino – Knowing that a mafioso, a man with convictions for murder and extortion and looking forward to a release from prison (although not imminent) has decided publicly to pay attention to you, is not exactly pleasant. It is true that a journalist knows very well that things like this can happen. But then, when they happen, in a certain sense they disorientate the journalist despite all his scenarios, reasoning and self-convincing. It was almost inevitable that this would happen. The truth is that you still feel disorientated. Fear takes hold when you know that a mafioso has publicly identified you as an undesirable individual, has labeled you, in a text accessible to anyone, with offensive phrases (which inevitably tangle up the private and professional spheres), accompanied by objectionable insinuations. These things affect your daily life. Even if the criminal boss is in prison there are others  outside who could pick up that message, add you to a list of undesirable people, of enemies, and therefore of people to fear and attack. These messages are conditioning and affect the serenity with which you frequent the places where those questionable individuals have roots. The messages affect your entering into a public place, forcing you to carefully check who is there and who is arriving, they affect you as you walk down a street, in the evening, alone, on foot or by car. All this happened to me.

In June 2018 I read an interview from prison with Augusto La Torre on the web. The mafioso from Mondragone, , used that opportunity to insult me ​​and some magistrates who had investigated him, and terminated his convoluted interview with some ominous expressions. I could not help but react to those phrases and therefore decided, with my newspaper, Cronache di Caserta, to sue him for the offence of  defamation.

Augusto La Torre had reacted in that agitated way because he had not liked some of my articles about an investigation of the local anti-Mafia directorate that had involved his son, Francesco Tiberio La Torre, and his brother Antonio. That investigation also revealed some of his own activities, which the anti-Mafia directorate had highlighted. And apparently he did not  like the fact that the press had taken an interest in them.

My lawsuit  led to a trial for defamation against La Torre, initially held in Naples. At the first hearing I was in court, and he was there, accompanied by prison officers who had escorted him from the prison where he was being held at the time. He was sitting a few metres away from me. At a certain point, he turned and reached out his hand, trying to shake mine. I didn’t reciprocate. My hand remained where it was, resting on the table.

In the following months, due to territorial jurisdiction, the case was transferred to Ivrea in northern Italy, not exactly around the corner from where I live and work in Campania. The judicial process is long, and still on-going, characterized by numerous postponements. It is  not easy to deal with it. In the most recent hearing I was questioned as the injured party. Augusto La Torre, via video link from the prison where he is being held, repeated his insults and sinister references  in the Ivrea courtroom before the judge.

Those who do my kind of job know that they can be sued for defamation. We journalists have the privilege of writing articles and the people we write about have the right to respond and, if they feel offended, to try to take us to court. But sometimes even those who do my job can react to excessive criticism with a defamation lawsuit. If journalists do sue, it is because they feel the need to re-establish a line of dignity and respect, a boundary that someone has crossed. Those who file these lawsuits know the risks they run: above all that of being left alone and having to face a usually long legal trail.

In this trail, I have been lucky because I have been accompanied, in addition to the newspaper I have worked for almost eight years and my lawyer Francesco Parente, also by the observatory Ossigeno per l’informazione. Ossigeno has supported me closely since the beginning of the affair, giving voice to my story and now awarding me a financial contribution to contribute to the legal costs that this judicial procedure  entails.

Legal and crime reporting is often presented as a source of problems, rather than as an important tool which gives voice to problems of public interest and makes known the way in which these problems arise. The activity of non-profit associations such as Ossigeno per l’Informazione is truly essential, because it gives strength and courage to those who work in the world of information often recounting unappreciated  facts and therefore attacked  Ossigeno’s support encourages me to resist, not to retreat, to continue to report what happens on the ground in the local area, because only by knowing what happens around us can we try to improve the world we live in.

Giuseppe Tallino

Crime syndicate boss on trial after defamation lawsuit by journalist Giuseppe Tallino