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The Crotone preliminary hearing judge Elisa Marchetto rejected the request for alternative rites advanced by the former vice president of the Province and former municipal councilor of Crotone, Fabio Manica, and by the entrepreneur Giacomo Combariati, involved in the investigation by the Crotone Prosecutor’s Office called “Teorema” which raised the veil on a series of contracts awarded – according to the investigators – by the body to nearby companies and professionals in exchange for bribes. In particular, Manica would have been the “dominus” of a criminal association that would have managed the fraudulent mechanism.
Warranty notices and precautionary measures
For this reason, last March the Crotone financial police had notified a notice of investigation to the former provincial administrator and to 19 other people, as well as seized assets for around 400 thousand euros, with various charges of criminal association aimed at corruption, forgery of public documents, fraud and fraud in public supplies.
In the following month of April, therefore, the judge for preliminary investigations Assunta Palumbo, accepting the request of the Public Prosecutor’s Office, ordered the precautionary custody in prison for Fabio Manica and Giacomo Combariati, considered by the investigators to be his right-hand man and who would have made his companies recipients of public contracts available to the group; the investigating judge also ordered house arrest for the professionals Luca Bisceglia and Rosaria Luchetta who allegedly carried out support functions by setting up ad hoc companies, receiving professional assignments, making their skills available to recover financing, paying and receiving the agreed fees. The ban on residence in the provincial territory was finally notified to the lawyer Francesco Manica, Fabio’s brother, who guaranteed legal assistance to the partnership by suggesting the formal participation of his wife to disguise the corporate structure.
The immediate judgment and the rejected requests
Last July, therefore, the Prosecutor’s Office made a request for immediate judgment against the five recipients of the precautionary measures which was accepted by the investigating judge. Fabio Manica asked to be judged with an abbreviated trial conditional on the hearing of five witnesses and the filing of a technical expert report. Combariati, however, asked to negotiate a sentence of 2 years and 11 months in prison, obtaining the consent of the public prosecutor.
Today, however, the Marchetto judge rejected both requests for which both Manica and Combariati will have to appear before the judges of the Court of Crotone for immediate judgment together with the other three suspects. The first hearing is set for October 14th.