The European Court of Human Rights ruled that Italy unlawfully eliminated the prospect of parole for four Mafia-linked prisoners whose life sentences initially allowed for release, finding that the policy shift increased their punishment retroactively.
According to the judgment issued Thursday, the men were convicted of multiple murders, attempted murders, massacres, drug trafficking, extortion, weapons offenses and Mafia association, largely in the 1980s and early 1990s. Though sentenced to life, their terms originally permitted a parole application after 26 years. Italian courts later conditioned any path to release on cooperation with prosecutors.
European Court of Human Rights finds unlawful increase in penalty
The court unanimously concluded that the change removed any realistic chance of release. Italian judges had applied a restrictive prison regime by interpreting the defendants’ conduct as using the “Mafia method,” an aggravating factor. That element had not been advanced in three of the cases and had been expressly rejected in the fourth, and the interpretive case law arose in 2001, years after the crimes.
Defense attorney Veronica Manca, who represented two applicants, said the ruling preserves judicial oversight of whether continued detention remains justified. It is about serving a sentence in line with legal principles and allowing a judge to assess progress toward potential release, she said.
Carlo Fiorio, a criminal procedure law professor at the University of Perugia, said converting a reducible life sentence into an irreducible one amounts to imposing a heavier penalty.
Anti-Mafia context and Section 4-bis
The stricter regime developed amid Italy’s violent confrontation with organized crime, when imprisoned members often remained loyal. After Cosa Nostra killed anti-Mafia judge Giovanni Falcone in May 1992, lawmakers tightened Section 4-bis the following month. Judge Paolo Borsellino was murdered weeks later.
Under the regime, people convicted of certain offenses lost access to parole, prison leave and alternatives to detention unless they cooperated, with silence treated as proof of ongoing danger.
Teresa Travaglia Cicirello, a criminal law scholar at the University of Messina, highlighted two fairness concerns. She cited the expectation against retroactive application of harsher rules and the expectation of an eventual opportunity to seek conditional release.
Legal shifts since 2019 and new eligibility criteria
In 2019, the European court rejected the automatic equation of silence with continuing danger. Italy’s Constitutional Court followed, and lawmakers revised the framework in 2022.
Under the new rules, noncooperating prisoners may pursue release if they demonstrate they no longer have ties to organized crime. Good conduct and rehabilitation alone are insufficient. In general, they must serve 30 years before applying, four years more than other lifers.
However, courts must account for credits such as pretrial detention and determine whether eligibility can be reached within 25 years. Otherwise, the promise of eventual release could arrive too late to satisfy human rights standards that prohibit inhuman treatment.
Sara Mastrapasqua, a criminal procedure law researcher at the University of Milan, described the decision as both an invitation and a warning for Italian judges. She said the effectiveness of the recognized “right to hope” for noncooperating life prisoners depends not just on removing the absolute bar but on applying the new requirements in a way that complies with the European convention. She also questioned how meaningful that hope will be in practice.
Impact on the applicants and next steps in the European Court of Human Rights case
Antigone, an Italian organization monitoring prisons and advocating for prisoners’ rights that intervened in the case, said the court embraced nearly all of its arguments. Its leaders, Patrizio Gonnella and Juan Patrone, welcomed a ruling they said reaffirms rule-of-law principles and aims to end life imprisonment without the prospect of release.
The violations ceased once the applicants obtained individualized review. Three did not show the new framework still denied a genuine chance of release. In the fourth case, an Italian judge restored parole eligibility in May 2022 but later rejected the application. None of the men will be released as a result of Thursday’s decision.
The Italian government did not respond to a request for comment. Either side has three months to seek referral to the Grand Chamber. If there is no referral, the judgment becomes final and Italy must pay each applicant 2,400 euros for nonpecuniary damage, along with legal costs in two cases.
Italy’s obligations under the judgment echo past human-rights disputes over criminal justice and detention, including high-profile U.S. cases such as the life term for a member of an extremist group that drew scrutiny over prison conditions and proportionality.