Four years of instruction and exemplary sentences in the asbestos case, the Italian justice delivered a historic verdict. For 16 years, French victims have been awaiting a criminal trial.
16 years in prison … The Italian verdict in the asbestos trial fell on Monday, February 13. The two former owners of the Eternit company have just been sentenced to exemplary sentences. Swiss billionaire Stephan Schmidheiny, and Belgian baron Jean-Louis Marie Ghislain de Cartier de Marchienne, tried for “criminal environmental disaster” and “willful omission of disaster relief measures” will also have to pay significant damages: 25 million euros for the municipality of Casale Monferrato where the factory was located, 20 million for the Piedmont region, 15 million for the health insurance funds and around 30,000 euros for the families of the victim.
To qualify this court decision, a qualifier came back almost permanently: “his-to-ri-que!” In fact, this extraordinary trial, bringing together more than 6,000 civil parties, was that of a public health affair which was also extraordinary. Indeed, according to the WHO, 125 million workers are exposed to asbestos in their workplace around the world and 90,000 die each year from asbestos-related diseases. In France, the most pessimistic forecasts in terms of public health count on 100,000 deaths by 2025.
Workers who have been exposed to asbestos fiber are actually at risk of developing several types of disease. The most emblematic, mesothemioma, is nothing other than asbestos cancer. This cancer of the pleura leaves no doubt: asbestos is the only culprit and it leaves no chance for its victims. Death very often occurs within a year of diagnosis.
Pierre Pluta, president of the National Association for the Defense of Asbestos Victims (Andeva): “The poisoners must be tried in France as in Italy”.
With the Andeva, a delegation of 160 victims and widows came to Turin from all regions of France (Burgundy, Rhône Alpes, Martigues, Dunkirk, Paris). Among them, former French Eternit factories. Attorney General Raffaele Guariniello had requested twenty years in prison. When the judge announced the verdict, the emotion was obviously very strong.
Pierre Pluta, present in Turin to attend the delivery of the verdict: “it was a thunderous applause”.
Today, all asbestos victims have their eyes on Italy. In France, the first complaints from victims date back over 16 years. And the investigation is still not complete. With Italy, the difference is obvious. The justice completed the investigation there in only 4 years. According to magistrates close to the case in France, the means made available to justice make all the difference. The Turin judge had dedicated medical experts, investigators attached to him. In France, the police or gendarmes who work on the asbestos file report to the Ministry of the Interior. In other words, the independence of the judiciary and the means made available to it make all the difference.
However, even if there has not been a major criminal trial, some employers have still been convicted of “inexcusable misconduct”, a system that allows compensation to victims for whom the occupational disease has been recognized. Of course, symbolically, it is less strong than a criminal conviction.
Jean-Pierre Grignet, pulmonologist in Denain in the North of France: “Punishment is not everything”.
The explosion represented by the Italian judgment could nevertheless move the lines. The FO-magistrates union has decided to knock on all doors. They seized the Superior Council of the Magistrature to be surprised at the lack of resources devoted to this file and wrote to parliamentarians so that the political will is there.
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