European Court rules Italy violated Mafia prisoners' parole rights

On Thursday the European Court of Human Rights unanimously decided that Italy breached the European Convention on Human Rights by permanently denying parole to four lifers linked to the Mafia. Although the men were sentenced to life with eligibility for release after 26 years, Italian courts later made parole contingent on cooperation with authorities, a condition the court said eliminated any realistic prospect of freedom and unlawfully heightened their sentences.

The restrictive rule relied on an aggravating “Mafia method” factor that was absent in three cases and rejected in the fourth, and it was derived from case law formulated in 2001, long after the offenses. Experts highlighted that converting a reducible life term into an irreducible one violates legal principles and that the decision restores the possibility of individual review, though the new rules still require at least 30 years of imprisonment for non-cooperating inmates.

Italy has three months to pay each prisoner €2,400 in non-pecuniary damages and to consider an appeal to the Grand Chamber. The judgment signals a warning to Italian judges to apply parole-eligibility criteria in line with human-rights standards.