Menarini, reasoning of the judgment Appeal: adhesion to the tax shield cannot be contested in criminal proceedings
“Does this Court hold that it is not conceptually correct to contest adherence to capital repatriation procedures in criminal proceedingsi, commonly defined tax shields, bringing them back to the paradigm of the crime of money laundering”. This is one of the most significant aspects of the motivation of the acquittal sentence ordered in the second degree of judgment, because the facts do not exist, a 
conclusion of the so-called "Menarini Process" by the Court of Appeal of Florence on 5 December against the brothers Lucia and Alberto Giovanni Aleotti. The two, sons of the owner of the pharmaceutical multinational Sergio Aleotti who died in 2014, were sentenced by the Court respectively to 9 years and 7 months and 7 years and 7 months for money laundering.
Ninety days after the conclusion of the appeal process, Between the 175 pages of motivation drawn up by the rapporteurs Venarubea and Bagnai, we thus read that "at a first and most elementary level of approximation, the logical difficulty (not to mention the inconsistency) inherent in attributing criminal relevance to a conduct that – ultimately – it all resolves itself in the exercise of a faculty provided for by a law of the State”.
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These statements that accepted what was argued in the appeal by the lawyer Alessandro Traversi of Florence, defender of Lucia Aleotti and who have the return of the huge assets (one billion and 200 million euros), the highest sum of money ever subjected to confiscation in Italy.
Another qualifying point of the judgment is the relative one to the subjective position of Lucia Aleotti, which in the first instance had been convicted of complicity in the crime of money laundering. Also in this case the Court accepted the arguments of the defence acknowledging that there was no contribution on his part to his father's laundering business.
In particular, the speakers write that withholding affirmation of responsibility by the judge of first instance is a "purely conjectural and moreover illogical conclusion. Conjectural, as devoid of any even minimal factual evidence and also illogical in its attempt to overcome the alternative explanation proposed by the defense".
Related news: Menarini appeal, brothers Lucia and Alberto Giovanni Aleotti acquitted
