Vecchi case: closure of the legal proceedings, the anti-globalization activist will not be returned to Italy

French justice will not hand over to Italy the Italian alter-globalist activist Vincenzo Vecchi, heavily condemned for violence during the G8 in Genoa in 2001, the general prosecutor’s office of Lyon having waived appeal.

The investigating chamber of the Lyon Court of Appeal rejected the request of the Italian judicial authorities on Friday March 24, but the future of the activist still remained in the hands of the general prosecutor’s office, which ultimately “will not regularize any appeal in cassation“, according to the court decision communicated this Tuesday to AFP.

“Respect for private and family life”

“It is an immense relief, the recognition of a legitimate fight carried out for four years“, reacted to AFP Maxime Tessier, one of the Italian’s lawyers. The 49-year-old activist fled to France in 2010 after being sentenced in 2009 to twelve and a half years in prison, then reduced to ten years. A European arrest warrant targeting him had led to his arrest in 2019 in Morbihan, where he lives.

In its judgment on Friday, the investigating chamber considered in particular that handing it over to Italy “would constitute a disproportionate interference with the right to respect for (his) private and family life“. In their pleadings, at the hearing of February 24, his lawyers had insisted at length on his “rooting», his professional and family integration in his country of exile.

2001 anti-G8 protests

The representative of the public prosecutor’s office had, on the other hand, demanded the surrender of the activist to his country, relying on a decision of the European Court of Justice (CJEU). Appearing free at the hearing, in the presence of his many supporters, Vincenzo Vecchi was sentenced for violence committed during the anti-G8 demonstrations organized in Genoa in July 2001.

The courts of appeal of Rennes in 2019 and Angers in November 2020 had already rejected the Italian request, that of Angers justifying in substance its decision by the fact that the charges for “devastation and plunder“, created under the regime of the fascist leader Mussolini, had no equivalent in France. After a new appeal by the public prosecutor’s office, the Court of Cassation had taken an opinion from the Court of Justice of the European Union. This, in March 2022, had indicated that it was not required to “perfect matchand that France could not oppose the extradition. The case was then referred to the Lyon Court of Appeal.