Investigations into corruption held in Milan, 1992/1998

• Autor(a) principal: Colombo, Gherardo
• Data de Publicação: 2005
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
• Texto Completo: http://hdl.handle.net/10071/162
• topic: Corruption (systemic); Crime; Judiciary; International judicial cooperation; Italian politics

In February 1992, what had begun as a simple case of extortion ended up by revealing that corruption in Italy had been widespread and systematic. More than five thousand people were investigated in the course of the enquiries, including Premiers, Members of Parliament, Ministers, and public and private entrepreneurs among others. The successful outcome of these investigations was achievable due to the conjugation of a series of elements: strong public opinion and media support, the independency of the Magistrates, Public Prosecutors and Judicial Police vis-à-vis the political sphere, and the efficiency of the strategy followed by the judiciary. Hampering even better results was the ineffectiveness of international judicial assistance, given that corrupt exchanges do often involve transnational cleaning operations.