Six Milan officers accused of illegal arrests and falsified reports
Milan prosecutors have sought imprisonment for six local police officers who allegedly staged unlawful arrests and altered reports to justify them. A total of fifteen officers are under investigation for illegal arrests, document forgery and embezzlement.
Inquiry into falsified arrests and fabricated detentions
According to ilpost.it, Milan prosecutors have sought preventive custody in prison for six officers of the Local Police accused of staging illegal arrests and falsifying reports to justify them. They are under investigation alongside nine other colleagues for illegal arrests, document forgery and embezzlement. The inquiry began last summer following a report from a lawyer assisting one of the men involved in the abuse.
According to prosecutors, the illegal arrests were designed to advance the career of commissioner Ilenja Sabato, accused of coordinating the operations. In the reports sent to magistrates to validate the arrests, the alleged offences were exaggerated, aggravated and in some cases invented to appear more efficient.
The operations allegedly involved the assistance of an informant drug dealer who wanted to have his competitors arrested. In some cases officers allegedly received gifts in exchange for favours or appropriated assets related to the cases. Following a search warrant, one of them allegedly took an electric bike worth a thousand euros.
The first arrest and the halved seizure
The arrest that triggered the inquiry dates to 16 July. According to prosecutors, following the informant's report, officers allegedly asked one of their collaborators to contact a drug dealer to purchase illegal substances. When the two met, the officers detained him. In the report the officers recorded a seizure of half a kilogram of hashish, but the document failed to include 1,450 euros in cash that the detainee claimed to have had with him.
The arrest of a minor and the commissioner in disguise
On 17 January, officers drew up a report describing how they had seen a minor take a package hidden in a tree and attempt to sell it. When they intervened, the boy left the package and attempted to flee. However, the sale was a charade: the woman the minor was contacting was commissioner Ilenja Sabato, a detail omitted from the report. Officers also wrote that the boy had attempted to kick them, a claim he denied, but the false assault was used to justify the cut lip the minor had sustained during his detention.
Arrests in other cities and territorial jurisdiction
Other incidents subject to prosecution date to 29 April and 5 May. In the first case, officers allegedly detained a man for an exchange of illegal substances that never occurred in Settimo Milanese, constructing a false version of events to justify an intervention outside their territorial jurisdiction. In the second case they allegedly attributed to a man possession of drugs found in a different apartment.
A conversation emerged in the files between an officer under investigation and a colleague who had criticised the minor's detention. "That's not how you take home an arrest. That boy was 16 years old. I'm sorry, but I think this was a forced arrest," the colleague had said.
Five of the six officers had been placed in preventive custody in prison in August, but the Court of Review subsequently granted them house arrest. Prosecutors have requested prison again, fearing the suspects may tamper with evidence.
Source: Google News IT — Crime (it)