News Supreme Court Judgments January 2018

Kicking the cohabitant out of the house and changing the lock is a crime

Judgment no. 610/2018 ruled the case of a woman who had prevented her cohabitant from accessing shared council housing by replacing the lock on the front door, and then assaulted him by throwing objects, as well as insults and threats, in order to induce him to leave the property and not return.

The Ermellini judges made it clear that the commission of the offense provided for in the aforementioned article does not necessarily postulate a situation of exclusive possession at the head of the offended person, but can also occur in cases where each of the compossessors disturbs the compossession exercised over the same property by others.

It is not a crime to call the politician who fails to keep election promises a liar

The crime of defamation cannot be committed if epithets are addressed to a politician that, although harsh and strong in tone, do not appear to be seriously defamatory and gratuitous, and are instead relevant to the topic under discussion, falling within the justification of the right to political criticism.

This was established by the Supreme Court in ruling no. 317/2018, concerning the case of some citizens who had been charged with the posting, along the streets of a Sicilian municipality, of public posters on which there were inscriptions, addressed to the mayor, with expressions such as “false, liar, hypocrite and evil.”

On this point, the Supreme Court recalled how criticism, and even more so political criticism, as an expression of merely subjective opinion, is by its nature conjectural in nature, which cannot, by definition, claim to be strictly objective and aseptic.

Legitimate dismissal of dad who is not with child during parental leave

Parental leave necessarily requires the performance, on a predominant basis, of activities in favor of one’s child, otherwise the employee who had requested it can be legitimately dismissed from his or her company.

The Supreme Court has noted that the potentative right to abstain from work is not entirely discretionary and may be subject to control: if the employee abuses his right, in fact, he infringes on the employer’s trust in him and deprives the employer of his work performance in an entirely unfair manner, while also unduly receiving the allowance paid by the pension fund.