People whose lives have been scarred by exposure to asbestos have a right to see their abusers punished. Unfortunately, in the UK the great asbestos barons escaped with their pensions intact and their liberty unaffected. Where our judicial system has failed, the Italian one has succeeded. The 2012 jail sentences handed down by a Turin Court to former asbestos businessmen Stephan Schmidheiny and Jean-Louis de Cartier de Marchienne were landmarks in the global fight for asbestos justice. Last week (September 25 and 27, 2014), the Italian press reported the latest prosecution for asbestos crimes. Public prosecutors Lorenzo Boscaglio and Gabriella Viglione have indicted thirty-nine defendants, all of whom were former owners or Chief Executive Officers of the Olivetti company; many of these individuals were well-known Italian businessmen. According to the press reports, asbestos contamination was rife at the Olivetti plant in Ivrea, thirty-five kilometres from Turin. A particularly worrying source of exposure was the talc used in the manufacturing process; it was contaminated with tremolite asbestos. ibasecretariat.org/lka-blog.php#a82
Posted on: Thu, 16 Oct 2014 07:58:37 +0000
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