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Italian Seismologists Charged With Manslaughter for Not Predicting 2009 Quake- CONVICTED - 6 of 7 CLEARED upon appeal

Re: Italian Seismologists Charged With Manslaughter for Not Predicting 2009 Quake- CONVICTED

Re: Italian Seismologists Charged With Manslaughter for Not Predicting 2009 Quake- CONVICTED

Laidback Al said:
I am not sure what point you are making here Giuseppe. Are you suggesting that this verdict will eventually be overturned by a Supreme Court verdict after 5 or 10 years? So the defendants should not worry about this conviction?

I have to agree with Sharon that such a trial, even if it is only political theater, is a serious threat to scientists and researchers everywhere, not just in Italy.

When the next pandemic comes, and the world is not prepared, will we convict the head the CDC or WHO for not sounding the alarm soon enough or loud enough?
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In Italy - people convicted in 1st grade - can make appeal against sentence automatically - without presenting new evidences - for a 2nd grade and then to ask Supreme Court to validate further the verdicts. If the statute of limitations (see also on Wikipedia http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prescrizione ) does not intervene firstly, the likelihood of have an overturn is as bigger as the number of lawyers an individual can hire.

I am seeing a lot of disconcert in media outlets, but in my opinion - and without enter into specific of the l'Aquila incident - there is a lot of misconception and bias in some of the commentaries and editorials about an alleged attack to science by a 'scientific illiterate Italy'.

This is not a good service offered to the respective readers of some of these media outlets (yesterday I've seen a BBC stating that ''scientists are jailed''), and a more profound analysis should be performed of the mistakes done during the l'Aquila incident both by national, local authorities as well as by technical commission and advisors.

And, I repeat, in Italy - where a crowd of lawyers is always under the spotlights - rarely manslaughter convicted people end in jail.

In Italy manslaughters are situation like these:

--- killing people driving a speeding car;
--- to cause a train disaster becasue of not have doing the due maintenance to tracks, signals and rolling stock;
--- to not take precaution and good maintenance of industrial plants resulting in blaze, fires and human loss;
....
 
Re: Italian Seismologists Charged With Manslaughter for Not Predicting 2009 Quake- CONVICTED

Re: Italian Seismologists Charged With Manslaughter for Not Predicting 2009 Quake- CONVICTED

If the Mayor of L'Aquila had asked the scientists to phrase their findings so as to not cause panic among the citizens of the town - would he also be convicted?
 
Re: Italian Seismologists Charged With Manslaughter for Not Predicting 2009 Quake- CONVICTED

Re: Italian Seismologists Charged With Manslaughter for Not Predicting 2009 Quake- CONVICTED

kiwibird said:
If the Mayor of L'Aquila had asked the scientists to phrase their findings so as to not cause panic among the citizens of the town - would he also be convicted?
Click to expand...

I admit that I find some difficulties to translate into plain English the convolute functioning of Italian jurisdiction.

That said, I have the impression that the misinterpretation of the trials (because there are several of these investigations ongoing, charging different people for other misconducts) should not result in a media attack to a wounded community (the L'Aquila City and its victims).

For sure, a lot of 'experts' (and I DO NOT link 'experts' word with the convicted scientists and advisors) were - at the time - usual hosts of almost all the political talk-show television programs, reassuring, playing down risks, and focusing attention elsewhere that prevention and pro-active measure for citizens.

The problem is that earthquakes in Italy are daily business but despite this reality, very little is done for active preparedness of the citizens.

For example: in a high risk area, with frail geological structures and knowledge of non-standard buildings constuctions from local and national authorities, people are not advised to make basic preps activities, no mapping of critical structures are publicly available, or path toward secure points...

I cannot make conclusions about the trial per se, but I can say that currently I do not see any kind of preparedness, alertness for common citizens.
 
Re: Italian Seismologists Charged With Manslaughter for Not Predicting 2009 Quake- CONVICTED

Re: Italian Seismologists Charged With Manslaughter for Not Predicting 2009 Quake- CONVICTED

Source: http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Back...-of-scientific-illiteracy-in-an-Italian-court

Earthquake predictions and a triumph of scientific illiteracy in an Italian court

An Italian court sentenced scientists to jail time for not having a functioning crystal ball ahead of the 2009 earthquake in L'Aquila. The arguments of science and reason fell on deaf ears.

By Dan Murphy, Staff writer / October 22, 2012

Rarely since a Catholic inquisition in Rome condemned Galileo Galilei to spend the remainder of his days under house arrest for the heresy of teaching that the Earth revolves around the sun, has an Italian court been so wrong about science...
 
Re: Italian Seismologists Charged With Manslaughter for Not Predicting 2009 Quake- CONVICTED

Re: Italian Seismologists Charged With Manslaughter for Not Predicting 2009 Quake- CONVICTED

Surely the issue here should be about building standards and regulations so that they can withstand quakes, and if such regulations exist, why they were not enforced. Are there investigations and procedings going ahead in this direction, and if not, why not?
 
Re: Italian Seismologists Charged With Manslaughter for Not Predicting 2009 Quake- CONVICTED

Re: Italian Seismologists Charged With Manslaughter for Not Predicting 2009 Quake- CONVICTED

Shiloh said:
Source: http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Back...-of-scientific-illiteracy-in-an-Italian-court

Earthquake predictions and a triumph of scientific illiteracy in an Italian court

An Italian court sentenced scientists to jail time for not having a functioning crystal ball ahead of the 2009 earthquake in L'Aquila. The arguments of science and reason fell on deaf ears.

By Dan Murphy, Staff writer / October 22, 2012

Rarely since a Catholic inquisition in Rome condemned Galileo Galilei to spend the remainder of his days under house arrest for the heresy of teaching that the Earth revolves around the sun, has an Italian court been so wrong about science...
Click to expand...

Rarely I have read a such offensive piece of bad journalism against an entire Nation, and - this is most important - against the victims of a faulty system of administration and public safety.

First, to respect a jurisdiction.
Second, to respect people who are struggling for search of the truth amid a lot of uncertainty.
Third, to respect the rights of thousands of citizens deprived of their properties and relatives.

If the crowd cohort of lawyers are so smart to ignite an international campaign of blame, I am sure their clients will be at safe sooner than later.

GM
 
Re: Italian Seismologists Charged With Manslaughter for Not Predicting 2009 Quake- CONVICTED

Re: Italian Seismologists Charged With Manslaughter for Not Predicting 2009 Quake- CONVICTED

Thank you to everyone for remaining civil in this discussion on FT. We have a difference of opinion and it is good to publicly post these differences so that people can read all view points. :tiphat:
 
Re: Italian Seismologists Charged With Manslaughter for Not Predicting 2009 Quake- CONVICTED

Re: Italian Seismologists Charged With Manslaughter for Not Predicting 2009 Quake- CONVICTED

Yes, different opinion.

This is the version of one of the victim relative: http://ilcentro.gelocal.it/pescara/cronaca/2012/10/23/news/gioire-no-ho-pianto-pensando-ai-miei-figli-1.5909311?fb_action_ids=4769040748373&fb_action_types=og.recommends&fb_ref=s%3DshowShareBarUI%3Ap%3Dfacebook-like&fb_source=other_multiline&action_object_map=%7B%224769040748373%22%3A327559400674896%7D&action_type_map=%7B%224769040748373%22%3A%22og.recommends%22%7D&action_ref_map=%7B%224769040748373%22%3A%22s%3DshowShareBarUI%3Ap%3Dfacebook-like%22%7D

No signs of anger is his voice, or vangeance. To keep in mind before drawing conclusions.
 
Re: Italian Seismologists Charged With Manslaughter for Not Predicting 2009 Quake- CONVICTED

Re: Italian Seismologists Charged With Manslaughter for Not Predicting 2009 Quake- CONVICTED

Source: BigThink: http://bigthink.com/risk-reason-and...campaign=Feed:+bigthink/main+(Big+Think+Main)


The l?Aquila Verdict. A Judgment Not Against Science, but Against A Failure of Scientists to Communicate

David Ropeik on October 23, 2012, 9:23 AM

A court in Italy has convicted six scientists and one civil defense official of manslaughter in connection with their predictions about an earthquake in l?Aquila in 2009 that killed 309 people. But, contrary to the majority of the news coverage this decision is getting and the gnashing of teeth in the scientific community, the trial was not about science, not about seismology, not about the ability or inability of scientists to predict earthquakes. These convictions were about poor risk communication, and more broadly, about the responsibility scientists have as citizens to share their expertise in order to help people make informed and healthy choices.

(...)

-
------
 
Re: Italian Seismologists Charged With Manslaughter for Not Predicting 2009 Quake- CONVICTED

Re: Italian Seismologists Charged With Manslaughter for Not Predicting 2009 Quake- CONVICTED

Italy earthquake decision: head of disaster body quits in protest at L'Aquila ruling

The head of Italy's top disaster body quit in protest on Tuesday after seven of its members were sentenced to six years in jail for manslaughter for underestimating the risks of a deadly 2009 earthquake.

3:50PM BST 23 Oct 2012

Luciano Maiami told the ANSA news agency he had resigned as head of the Major Risks Committee because "there aren't the conditions to work serenely," a day after the watershed ruling that sent shock waves through the international scientific community.

The seven defendants are appealing Monday's ruling by the court in the medieval town of L'Aquila in central Italy, an area devastated by the April 2009 earthquake that killed 309 people.

Maiami, one of Italy's top physicists and a former head of top particle physics laboratory Cern in Geneva, criticised the verdict as "a big mistake".

"These are professionals who spoke in good faith and were by no means motivated by personal interests, they had always said that it is not possible to predict an earthquake," he told the Corriere della Sera newspaper.

More...
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/wor...-body-quits-in-protest-at-LAquila-ruling.html
 
Re: Italian Seismologists Charged With Manslaughter for Not Predicting 2009 Quake- CONVICTED - 6 of 7 CLEARED upon appeal

Italian earthquake case is no anti-science witch-hunt

16:40 23 October 2012
Magazine issue 2888

...
It is easy to feel outrage at the jail terms handed down to six Italian seismologists and a civil servant this week. How could anyone hope to have predicted the earthquake that devastated L'Aquila in 2009?

That is the rallying cry, but failure to predict the quake is not, in fact, what the seven men have been convicted of. The prosecution made it crystal clear all along that their case was about poor risk communication; it was built on an accusation of giving out "inexact, incomplete and contradictory information".

On this charge, there was clearly a case to answer. Employed by Italy's Major Hazards Committee to assess earthquake risks and communicate them to the government and the public, the seismologists got the science right, but left the job of public communication to a civil protection official with no specialist knowledge of seismology. His statement to the press was, to put it mildly, a grossly inaccurate reflection of the situation: "The scientific community tells us there is no danger, because there is an ongoing discharge of energy. The situation looks favourable." At this point, the seismologists should have stepped in. But they did not, and the message stuck....

... Scientists valued for their expertise should speak for themselves rather than letting others speak for them. Lives are at stake.

Full text:
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn22416-italian-earthquake-case-is-no-antiscience-witchhunt.html
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Re: Italian Seismologists Charged With Manslaughter for Not Predicting 2009 Quake- CONVICTED

Re: Italian Seismologists Charged With Manslaughter for Not Predicting 2009 Quake- CONVICTED

These convictions were about poor risk communication, and more broadly, about the responsibility scientists have as citizens to share their expertise in order to help people make informed and healthy choices.
Click to expand...
If it is about risk communication, then who bears the burden? The scientists apparently were truthful. Maybe the public should bring a suit against the politicians for poor interpretation or communication? Maybe it is the fault of the general populace for not being self-informed and interpreting the information for themselves? After all, earthquakes are not rare in Italy.

It seems to me that some are searching to place blame for a natural disaster. By definition, natural disasters are unpredictable. But lets blame someone anyway.

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Re: Italian Seismologists Charged With Manslaughter for Not Predicting 2009 Quake- CONVICTED

Re: Italian Seismologists Charged With Manslaughter for Not Predicting 2009 Quake- CONVICTED

Please take note that this article is dated of June 3, 2011

If you?re waiting for an earthquake warning, you?re doing it wrong

Posted on June 3, 2011 by Chris Rowan

...
The message the seismologists probably wanted to convey (and, admittedly, failed to) was that there was no immediate danger ? beyond the normal risks associated with living in a tectonically active region. In Italy, events like the 2009 earthquake are no surprise at all: since 1900 the country has been stuck by 11 magnitude 6 or greater earthquakes, including the 1915 Avezzano earthquake, only 30 km or so south of L?Aquila, that had an estimated magnitude of 7 and killed more than 30,000 people. Italy?s equivalent of the USGS or BGS, the INGV, produced this map of the seismic hazard in 2004. Guess which city falls smack bang in the middle of one of the areas of highest risk?

Seismic hazard map for Italy, showing the peak ground accelerations that have a 10% chance of being exceeded in 50 years. Source: INGV.

This is the real crux of the issue: for those living in L?Aquila, a damaging earthquake was inevitable. And, given that there is no reliable method of short-term earthquake prediction, waiting for some sort of official warning so that you could then rush around like a headless chicken is not a good strategy. What you need to do is acknowledge you live in a seismically active area, and be prepared for the earthquakes that are a consequence of this, whenever they chose to strike. For the authorities, this means setting and enforcing building codes, improving the resilience of vital infrastructure, and making sure clear emergency response plans are in place. For the general populace, it is about making sure you know how to best protect yourself when your house starts shaking.
...

Full text:
http://all-geo.org/highlyallochthon...r-an-earthquake-warning-youre-doing-it-wrong/
 
Re: Italian Seismologists Charged With Manslaughter for Not Predicting 2009 Quake- CONVICTED

Re: Italian Seismologists Charged With Manslaughter for Not Predicting 2009 Quake- CONVICTED

Translation Google

Note the consequences of the judgment of the Department Major Risks

October 23, 2012

The Civil Protection Department feels obliged to draw the picture of the consequences are already affecting the National Service of Civil Protection as a result of convictions issued yesterday by the Court of L'Aquila against four former members of the National Commission for Prediction and Prevention of Major Risks, the then Deputy Head of the Department of Civil Protection, the Director of Risk seismic and volcanic Department itself and the then director of the National Center for Earthquake National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology.

The first consequence concerns the resignation formally presented to the President of the Council of Ministers by the members of the Commission appointed Major Risks December 23, 2011, as well as those of Professor Mauro Dolce, director of the seismic and volcanic risk of the Department.

The second leads to paralysis of foresight and prevention, since it is easy to imagine the impact of this story on all those who are called to take responsibility in these areas considered to be the pillars of a modern civil protection. The risk is that it will decline more than twenty years ago, when the civil protection was only helping and assisting in emergency occurred. Or that those who are responsible for evaluating end to raise the alert level to the maximum whenever the forecast models provide diverse scenarios, generating an exponential growth of alarms that will cause absolute distrust of those who emits or panic among the population.

In both cases, the institutions - first of all the mayors - which by law are required to plan and make decisions to protect their own citizens, it will have to do without the fundamental support of those who until yesterday, having the necessary skills and experiences, provided assessments and interpretations on a number of risks that affect the Italian territory and that now no longer feel protected by the country for which they serve.

Thirdly, we can not forget how many issues, being acutely, which the Department of Civil Protection in danger of losing essential partners: for example, the earthquake swarm going on for almost two years in the Pollino, or reference scenarios for updating the national contingency plans for the Neapolitan volcanoes.

If the judgment apparently seems to affect only the scientific world, remember, finally, that touches instead heavily other realities and professionalism cornerstone of the National Service of Civil Protection: from hundreds of technical Functional Centres and Centres of expertise every day take care to monitor, supervise and evaluate the natural phenomena in order dell'allertamento administrations and operational structures, but also the many professionals of many orders that free and voluntarily provide their time and expertise in emergency. Last example in this regard was the work in the post-earthquake in Emilia, where they contributed to the development of tens of thousands of tests of viability of the damaged buildings.

Against this background, without prejudice to the responsibilities for which everyone is called to respond, the Civil Defence Department, while ensuring to perform their own tasks, hopes that the institutions of the country to find a way to return to serenity and efficiency 'whole system in the conduct of its activities.

http://www.protezionecivile.gov.it/...9A9CCF20A6E3CDCAB6AB84A7D0?contentId=COM35850
 
Re: Italian Seismologists Charged With Manslaughter for Not Predicting 2009 Quake- CONVICTED

Re: Italian Seismologists Charged With Manslaughter for Not Predicting 2009 Quake- CONVICTED

Nature | Editorial

Shock and law

</HGROUP>The Italian system?s contempt for its scientists is made plain by the guilty verdict in L?Aquila.

<TIME datetime="2012-10-23" pubdate="">
23 October 2012
...
The seven ? Bernardo De Bernardinis, Enzo Boschi, Giulio Selvaggi, Franco Barberi, Claudio Eva, Mauro Dolce and Gian Michele Calvi ? are appealing against the verdict. They will remain free until the appeals process is finished, which could take years.

That provides an opportunity.There will be time enough to ponder the wider implications of the verdict, but for now all efforts should be channelled into protest, both at the severity of the sentence and at scientists being criminalized for the way their opinions were communicated. Science has little political clout in Italy and the trial proceeded in an absence of informed public debate that would have been unthinkable in most European countries or in the United States. Billi should promptly explain his decision, and the scientific community should promptly challenge it.

Full text:
http://www.nature.com/news/shock-and-law-1.11643
</TIME>
 
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