Stealing food out of necessity not a crime, Italian high court rules
Italy’s Supreme Court of Cassation, Rome
(CNS): A homeless man who was sentenced in 2013 to six months in jail and fined around €100 fine (US$115) for stealing €4.07 (US$4.50) worth of cheese and sausage from a supermarket in Genoa, Italy, has seen his conviction overturned after a court rule that taking food out of necessity is not a crime. The Supreme Court of Cassation, the Italian appeal court, found that Roman Ostriakov (36), a Ukrainian national who was caught in 2011 trying to take food without paying for it, was not stealing as he was hungry.
“The condition of the defendant and the circumstances in which the merchandise theft took place prove that he took possession of that small amount of food in the face of the immediate and essential need for nourishment, acting therefore in a state of need,” the court said, adding that the incident therefore “does not constitute a crime”.
The news story, which was first reported in the local media, has gone global as the decision went far beyond the basis of the appeal, which was calling for a more lenient sentence. Analysts believe the declaration that stealing when hungry is not a crime and the court’s decision was based on the Italian legal doctrine “Ad impossibilia nemo tenetur”, which means “No one is expected to do the impossile”.
Commentators in Italy have celebrated the decision, pointing out that court has ruled that the right to survival has prevailed over the right to property.
Category: Courts, Crime, Europe, World News
@11:41am; best comment, well said.
This is the logical thing to state.
Just one cornetto…..give it to me…..
I’m kind of hungry right now.
Did he break in and entered. What about asking for the food. These crazy Italianos
Ukrainian, not Italian
Thank you for your humanitarian views and for recognizing that man’s need. God bless you.
He could have asked for food. No need to steal.
Do you really believe that there is nowhere in Italy that provides for the poor? I guess shop lifting for food is now a green light.
Supermarkets look out the lifters are coming, since some of our people believe the thieves have the right to take whatever they want. Limited mentality.
Thank them when he breaks into your house or place of business. He couldn’t get a job or social security?
Thanks CNS for keeping us up to date with news from the Italian courts :0/
Remember the The Dormant Accounts Law 2010? It requires to transfer monies that are in dormant accounts to the Government after seven years of account inactivity. Just SEVEN YEARS! Stealing the way I see it. Help yourself in other words.
Meantime Michelle Bouchard, whose name was legally on the joint account got 12 years for ‘eye-watering’ theft.
The former is more ‘eye-watering’ theft than the latter in my opinion.
In states, unclaimed money are safeguarded indefinitely, in the Cayman Islands they are appropriated just after 7 years.
I am baffled by her sentence. Apparently boopsing is illegal in Cayman for “some” women. To me she may have been wrong from a moral stand point but what she did was not illegal. Her name was legally on his accounts and or?? It wasn’t her money but she legally had rights to withdraw as she pleased and boy did she.
Agree. I hope she will appeal. If The Dormant Accounts Law 2010 justifies appropriation of someone’s money without permission (a theft in essence), her actions were not illegal, as she had been permitted by the virtue of having her name on the account.
Her case should have been tried in the Cayman Islands to start with.
correction: Her case should NOT have been tried in the Cayman Islands to start with
There we go. One can justify anything!
Putting humanitarianism aside, what on the face of this earth is the point of fining a man 100 pounds who has to steal to stay alive?
Yeah, right. Ukrainian is starving in Rome. Give me a break. No one would have refused to feed him if he had only asked.
Perhaps you should report your findings to the Italian high Court.
Well maybe they’ll let me out of this damn place if i say i stole that $11.00 to buy food.
Well done! Totally agree!
Oh great. There goes my mango crop. Again.
If the parrots don’t get it first.
The parrots I deal with walk on two feet and have two arms. Disgusting thieves.
The Italian High Court recognizes that, like the REAL parrots, these parrots have to eat too.
9:31am I am patiently waiting on the thieves, who believe they own my property. Anyone you find within your property make an example for the others.
You will make an example for others in jail for sure.
…except that last time I checked Cayman wasn’t bound by the decisions of the Italian High Court…