Porto Torres, magistrates Grasso and Salvi to the students: "Be the ones to eradicate illegality"

«This silver lighter tells about my relationship with Judge Falcone. He handed it to me when he decided to quit smoking, he told me to keep it in custody and to return it to him once he decided to start smoking again, but unfortunately I didn't have time, the Capaci massacre canceled everything. I decided to keep it because it gives me the strength to fight».

Pietro Grasso, the former president of the Senate and of the National Anti-Mafia Directorate who rose to the "chair" of the Mario Paglietti high school in Porto Torres, took that lighter out of his pocket on the occasion of the initiative "Memories and commitment in places of legality and justice ", promoted and curated by the Vittorio Occorsio foundation, as part of the "Justice adopts the school" project, to tell his testimony in the fight against the mafia, his friendship with Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino, symbolic victims of the battle against organized crime.

A master class held together with another illustrious former magistrate, Giovanni Salvi, president of the Scientific Committee of the "Vittorio Occorsio" Foundation and former attorney general at the Court of Cassation . "Be you young people, the adults of tomorrow, to fight against illegality with your weapons", underlined the two presidents. Not only an insight into the theme of justice but a real lesson on their life and professional experience , when they were still wearing the toga, a story on the criminal facts that particularly marked Italy in the 80s, lessons addressed to the many students who this morning they filled the high school auditorium, together with teachers and representatives of civil and military institutions.

The mayor of Porto Torres, Massimo Mulas, the director of the Asinara National Park, Vittorio Gazale and the head teacher Daniele Taras, who were present at the table moderated by the teacher Flavio Piras, brought institutional greetings. During the morning also greetings from the prefect of Sassari, Paola Dessì. The regional coordinator of the Occorsio foundation, Ursula Ruiu, was present at the meeting.

From judge Cesare Terranova to the president of the Sicily Region, Piersanti Mattarella, the captain of the carabinieri Emanuele Basile, the prosecutor Gaetano Costa, statesmen killed because they were engaged in fighting drug trafficking, terrorist organizations and the mafia. And then again Carlo Alberto Dalla Chiesa, Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino. A long list of men protagonists of a period of violent Sicily when heinous murders were the order of the day. Grasso recounts that "the mafia war that paved the streets of Palermo with corpses began in the 1980s, a trail of deadly attacks: between the years 1981 and 1983, about 600 people were killed on the streets, plus those deaths of shotgun white to reach the impressive number of a thousand corpses in a few years. In the meantime, the excellent murders of those who represent the institutions continue, a phenomenon that needed to be countered".

Hence the birth of the anti-mafia pool, the maxi trial against Cosa Nostra, prepared by judges Falcone and Borsellino on the island of Asinara. The former magistrate explained the duty to tell his testimony and the teachings received from Falcone and Borsellino.

"I want to return to Asinara to experience that emotion - said Grasso moved - a place of memory that preserves the story of two great men, who for a month stayed forced in the guesthouse to prepare for the trial that saw 475 defendants on trial".

Prosecutor Salvi recalled the heinous murder of Vittorio Occorsio, a magistrate who was the victim of a neo-fascist terrorist attack, Ordine Nuovo, which took place in Rome on 10 July 1976.

" The assassin of Occorsio, Pierluigi Concutelli, was detained in the Asinara prison , where he strangled with his own hands two prisoners who were supposed to testify in the trial of the Bologna massacre", explains Salvi who recounts the beginning of the bloody period in Sicily. "The first massacre dates back to 1963 when a Giulietta exploded causing the death of seven carabinieri, bomb squad and state police". For students, an extraordinary lesson on the principles of legality and justice, which represents an important step for the in-depth study of these issues, which can be completed in the visit to Asinara to be held in September.