ON TRAIL FOR G8 GENOVA RAISES THE CASE OF MISSING TAPE
Taken from “Il manifesto 26\03\2006”

Seized on Diaz night. Filmmaker claims frame about police brutality is missing.

Intimidation after trial, filmmaker from Bologna was stopped by police and his video on Diaz assault was seized and edited. They threatened me, he claims.

By SIMONE PIERANNI
GENOVA

“I remember that someone was hands up, on second or third floor at Diaz, then was dropped to the floor by some police officers. Of these, one was beating them to floor and I could clearly see it as I was filming with my camera and I could zoom in.”

The video was shown in court but the part described above was missing.

The witness watching it, had no doubt the, “video has been cut”.

M.V, a man on his thirties from Bologna, freelance video-maker and activist, worked for many independent news networks, between those, when facts happened, Indymedia, talked about the missing video explaining, as he had a technician background, that the cuts were only possible on the post-editing step, not before.

But his day wasn’t over just after being in court, at 5 p.m., once he left for train station, he was stopped by two police officers who, he claims, invited him not to charge police officers on trial anymore.

This was a proper threat and the guy decided to take police officers to court.

The story about missing parts on video are just few of those surrounding the trial on Genoa. The video was filmed at night by M.V from one of Diaz Pascoli’s windows, on 20th of July 2001, while police was raiding Diaz.

The film was seized by police as they raided the Genoa Social Forum room and disappeared and his author claimed that it was missing.

Police then took it to court as trial proof and it was shown to the witness who claimed that some parts were missing as he remembered filming them.

Hearing his deposition, 29 police officers and their lawyers were surprised, as they probably had not read the report about the Diaz night, when M.V talked about the video cuts.

On report M.V widely talked about his shots: on July 21st, he saw a police car driving off slow just next to Diaz: apparently no one was throwing anything from the school, as instead reported by police once they got back to the station. And that was also the reason why they claimed for seizing the school.

“I was in last room to the right, just on top of the corridor on the third floor, the one that shows Cesare Battisti, M.V explained.

"I heard someone screaming and once I looked out of the window I saw one hundred police officers or more wearing blue helmets, screaming and trying to force, the school opposite, entrance. The courtyard was desert, so they used a van to force main entrance.”
At this point he handled the camera and shot the frames later edited and now shown on trial.

The unpleasant “out of trial” episode clearly confirms the truth of his testimony and the storms around Genova trial.

The Diaz case will carry on in the first week of April, while later today will take place one about Bolzaneto brutalities.