Risks commission members to face trial over failure to give sufficient warning about L'Aquila earthquake in 2009

This article is more than 9 years old

This article is more than 9 years old

Seven experts responsible for evaluating the threat of natural disasters in Italy have been charged with manslaughter for allegedly failing to give sufficient warning about the devastating L'Aquila earthquake in 2009.

Judge Giuseppe Romano Gargarella ordered the members of the Great Risks commission to go on trial in L'Aquila on 20 September.

The judge said the defendants "gave inexact, incomplete and contradictory information" about whether smaller tremors in L'Aquila six months before the 6.3 magnitude quake on 6 April, which killed more than 300 people, should have been viewed as warning signs of the subsequent disaster.

Defence lawyers condemned the charges, arguing that it was impossible to predict earthquakes. Prosecutors point to a memo issued after a commission meeting on 31 March 2009, which was called because of mounting concerns about the seismic activity in the Abruzzo region, in central Italy.

The memo stated that it was "improbable" there would be a major quake, but the threat could not be discounted.

Commission members also told the local media that it was impossible to predict quakes, adding that six months of low-magnitude tremors was not unusual in the highly seismic region and did not mean a major quake would follow.

An interview with commission member Bernardo De Bernardis, of the national civil protection department, in which he rejects suggestions that the public should worry, is cited in the prosecutor's case.

Asked whether residents should just sit back and relax with a glass of wine, he said, "Absolutely, a Montepulciano doc [a Tuscan red wine]. This seems important."

The charges filed by the prosecution contends that this assessment "persuaded the victims to stay at home", La Repubblica newspaper reported.

The earthquake killed 308 people in and around L'Aquila, which was largely reduced to rubble. Thousands of survivors lived in tent camps or temporary housing for months.

Defence lawyers contend that since quakes cannot be predicted, the accusations that the commission's scientists and civil protection experts should have warned that a major quake was imminent make no sense.

"As we all know, quakes aren't predictable," said Marcello Melandri, defence lawyer for defendant Enzo Boschi, a scientist who heads the National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology.

Melandri added that the panel "never said, 'stay calm, there is no risk'".

Manslaughter charges for natural disasters are not unusual in Italy, but they have previously concerned breaches of building codes in areas at risk of quakes.