With this paper, the author aims to propose a synthesis of the current state of the Court's Strasbourg case-law on environmental matters: starting with the notion of positive obligations, the author analyses the main interpretative guidelines with which the judges have extended the scope of the right to life under Art. 2 Cedu and the right to privacy under Art. 8 Cedu to assert a conventional environmental right for protection the individual. The protection of the victims of environmental crimes offers a interesting reflection point in relation to its normative implications, due to the recent legislative reform and to the perspective of protecting the victim in the criminal process, which is considerably stronger today.
This paper examines the recent reform of art. 157, par. 6 of Italian Criminal Code enacted by the Law n. 68 of 2015, which doubles up the limitation period for any of the Environmental Crimes established in Title VI bis. Its approach focuses on a sound analysis of legal, political and systematic meanings and implications of the new provision, as well as on to what extent there are plausible reasons to justify the reform. What emerges raises serious doubts concerning the usefulness of the current regime, in the light of scope of the reform and the main features of the new environmental crimes. It is questioned as well the consistency of the new provisions with the broader area of environmental protection under criminal law, also in the perspective of the scrutiny on reasonableness by the Constitutional Court.
The Law No 68 of 22 May 2015 introduced a diversionary procedure enabling the out-of-court settlement of certain minor criminal violations of the Environmental Code (Legislative Decree No 152 of 3 April 2006). This article analyses in depth the various stages of this innovative procedure, placing particular emphasis on its possible legal qualification. The policy functions of the new procedure and its scope of application are also critically assessed. Conclusively, the article concentrates on the new procedure's compliance with the principles of restorative justice. It is sumbitted that this new diversion scheme can be regarded as a form of de facto decriminalisation, based on a bargaining process which sits ad odds with aims of restorative justice.
As for Criminal Law concerning individuals, tensions affect the principle of legality also in the matter of corporate criminal liability, due to interpretations aimed at expanding the catalogue of predicate offences beyond the boundaries defined by the legislator. The problem is addressed from the environmental criminal law perspective, as up until now, this field has represented the first and main testing ground for the principle of legality in the "231 system". Starting from the Ilva case, this contribution goes back over the controversial relationship between environmental crimes and the crime of association, highlighting how art. 24-ter of the decree – also in the light of certain developments related to transnational organized crime – risks turning into a passe-partout provision, with consequences on the actual possibility of building the compliance program and on the corporate “culpability” itself. The relevance of the crime of association in this matter is confirmed by the introduction of the environmental aggravating circumstance for crimes of association in the new title VI-bis of the Criminal Code (Art. 452-octies c.p.). Such introduction calls for further reflections, as the provision shows aspects of irrationality related to sanctions for the collective entities.
The article is focused on the profound innovations to the corporate liability ,that have been introduced by Italian Law n.68/2015 related to the environmental crimes.The corporate liability, which has been introduced by the Decree Legislative n.121/2011 that have inserted the art. 25 undecies into the Decree Legislative n. 231/2001, has an implemented list of enviromental crimes. The analysis, from one side, will focus on the critical aspect of this matter, in particular with reference to the new regulation related to the cancellation of fines, and to no reference to the systems of enviromental management. From the other side, it concerns to the possible future scenario of the regulamentation, which still needs further rules in order to be fully in compliance with the principles of legal certainty.
La riforma in materia di ecoreati, attuata con la l. 68/2015, ha previsto l’introduzione nel codice penale di una serie di nuove fattispecie di reato a tutela dell’ambiente. L’analisi degli Autori è estremamente critica rispetto all’intero impianto della riforma, e si appunta in particolare sulla nuova fattispecie di disastro, ritenuta in insanabile contrasto con i principi costituzionali di tassatività e precisione, e sulle ipotesi colpose, considerate un pessimo esempio di tecnica legislativa. Si salva solo la nuova fattispecie di inquinamento: sebbene nemmeno in questo caso la formulazione della norma appaia irreprensibile, tuttavia gli Autori ritengono senz’altro opportuna la scelta del legislatore di prevedere una incriminazione ad hoc per gravi fatti di compromissione dell’ambiente, fino a oggi sanzionabili solo ai sensi delle bagatellari fattispecie contravvenzionali previste dal TUA.
La sentenza annotata si inscrive nel novero delle pronunce della Suprema Corte volte a riaffermare la piena vigenza, anche nel sistema della responsabilità ex crimine, del principio di legalità nelle sue diverse articolazioni. In particolare, la vicenda concreta è stata occasione per ribadire l’operatività del principio di irretroattività della norma sfavorevole all’ente in quanto estensiva della relativa responsabilità ai reati ambientali selezionati dal d.lgs. 121/2011, in fase di prima attuazione della direttiva 99/2008/CE sulla tutela penale dell’ambiente.
La legge 22 maggio 2015 n. 68 sugli ecoreati costituisce una svolta “epocale” per il diritto penale dell’ambiente. Il presente contributo analizza le principali novità della riforma, evidenziandone pregi e punti deboli, sia sotto il profilo della “tenuta” in chiave teorica delle soluzioni normative adottate, sia con riguardo alla loro concreta efficacia, in termini di rafforzamento del complessivo livello di tutela dell’ambiente.