Palermo, rigged competitions at the Policlinico: father and daughter under arrest

They allegedly rigged competitions for full professors and university researchers at the "Paolo Giaccone" Polyclinic in Palermo: the Nas carabinieri carried out an order under house arrest against a former professor and director of the surgery department of the Polyclinic, now retired, and of his daughter, a plastic surgeon at the Civic hospital of Palermo.

Prohibitions were also notified to public offices, for a period of 12 months, with the obligation of presentation to the judicial police, to 11 suspects. Ten other people under investigation in a state of freedom.

The suspects are charged, for various reasons, with the crimes of corruption, embezzlement, disturbed freedom of choice of the contractor, fraud, revelation and use of professional secrets, ideological falsehood in electronic documents, slander and abuse of office.

Among the eleven recipients of the interdiction provision, five are at the Department of the Polyclinic (a former full professor, a full professor in service, an associate professor, a researcher, a nurse); another is full professor and director of the department of surgical, oncological and stomatological disciplines; one is the son of the former university professor and director of the Surgery Department of the Polyclinic, who at the time was serving at the Policlinico di Messina and at the moment is an employee of the Policlinico di Palermo; four are full professors of Surgery serving at the Universities of Rome (Campus Bio-Medico), Naples (Vanvitelli) and Messina, who have held the functions of presidents and members of commissions in various university competitions.

THE INVESTIGATION - The investigation started in June 2019, when a doctor from the Policlinico di Palermo filed a complaint in which he reported illicit behavior by the director of a hospital department that would have influenced a university competition for the appointment of a full professor .

According to the Carabinieri of the Nas of Palermo, the suspects altered the natural outcome of the competitions, as part of a "pact of alternation": the candidates were linked to one or the other accomplice, thanks also to the collusion of other members of the commissions , often designated among subjects close to them.

Different methods were used, both by influencing the methods of evaluation criteria of candidates and their qualifications, and by collecting information intended to remain secret with the collaboration of members of the commissions, on the provisional scores attributed by the commissioners to the candidates in order to have new provisional rankings or insert, in the minutes of the committee meetings, selection criteria more favorable to the candidates of their liking, up to resorting to sending letters, which were recommended to be destroyed immediately after reading, in which the candidates were reported of satisfaction.

(Unioneonline / vl)