DIAZ RAID: EVIDENCE AGAINST OFFICERS DISSAPPEARED

GENOA – the “pony-tail” officer who no one knows, the arrest statement that no one signed, and now the “Gutturnio” and “Colli Piacentini” wine bottles that were made into Molotov Cocktails have disappeared without a trace. The two Molotov bottles that police found were the evidence against the 93 demonstrants arrested on the Diaz raid. It was July 2001, and that evidence should have proven that the 93 “no global” demonstrators were dangerous “Black Blok”, instead it became the strongest evidence against police. Those Molotov Cocktails were planted in order to justify the violent assault and aggression.

The truth is that those bottles were confiscated in the afternoon while street clashes were taking place and then moved by the officers into the school at night just before the raid started. Since then that evidence was the core evidence against police since the trial started on April 2005. In Italy the media “forgot” about this story. But abroad it is different; in the UK the BBC exposed this when talking about the Genoa trials with witness and British journalist Mark Covell, who was assaulted and seriously injured just outside the school. The Frankfurt Allgemeine, published as a main story the nightmare of german activist Lena Zuhlke, who suffered one year in hospital to recover from police kicks and punches. And it is not a dead trial; many things happen on the twice a week sessions.

Yesterday, for the first time since 2005, all police officers lawyers met. It should have been a session dedicated to the Molotov row. Lawyers asked then to show this evidence, as all the public speech was about pictures taken before the two bottles were registered and stored in the criminal evidence police offices. But suddenly all realized that no one had never seen the Molotov “live”.

The last news was on 2002 when the prosecutor demanded to Genoa Questura to provide proof of the Molotov bottles from the G8 days. The Questura answered there were five, although three were destroyed, the two left were those from Diaz and were stored in criminal evidence police office. Since then no one knows what happened to them. It is not the firstcase of “missing evidence” since this controversial trial started. It happened already with mobile operator Wind list of calls. Questura claimed that the prosecutor had them but then they were found in the Squadra mobile (police) offices.

It maybe that simply the Molotovs are not in the right place and, as happened with other “missing evidence”, will reappear later, but what is sadly true is that the police are trying their best to delay and obstruct the trial against them. On the last session no-one recognized the “pony tail” officer, who does not appear on any official statement, but he is there on all the films taken of the Diaz raid, giving orders to other police officers. The false statement has 15 signatures but no one could tell who was the 15th signatary.

The only exception is Luca Salvemini, Vice Questore in Palermo, who investigated in 2002 on behalf of the Genoa prosecutors about false evidence. He did it. And last week told the trial the two Molotov Cocktails were placed in the Diaz school while top Italian officers were standing outside in the Diaz courtyard, chatting, hopefully without realizing what was going on. His speech in the trial proves lack of help and the obstacles by his colleagues. While the search for the missing evidence is going on the core of Diaz trial has been “frozen” until further notice.