Car thefts, a bill provides for harsher penalties and confiscation of the receiver's goods

Imagine a long line of cars, one after the other, over 600 kilometers long. A little more than the distance between Rome and Milan. These are the cars stolen in Italy in 2024, a good 136 thousand vehicles. With a 3% increase compared to the previous year. And with a doubling of stolen commercial vehicles, which even marks an increase of 112% compared to 2023. Stolen goods that are dismantled within 24 hours, with the parts immediately sent along the Eastern European, North African and Middle Eastern routes. An increasingly widespread criminal business that a bill now wants to combat, introducing heavier penalties for car thefts. In Parlamento24 we talked about it with the first signatory of the bill, Senator Dario Damiani of Forza Italia.

An ad hoc measure is necessary, explains Senator Damiani, "for three reasons. First of all, because the phenomenon is a social plague throughout Italy and particularly affects some regions. The cruelty and unscrupulousness with which these thefts occur in broad daylight is also a public order problem. Second, from an economic point of view, not only because of the damages that families suffer, but also because insurance companies, in many regions and in many areas and provinces, absolutely do not want to insure vehicles anymore. And then there is also the disparity. A vehicle purchased and insured in a specific province where the number of thefts is high, has a different price than an insurance policy in another area of ​​Italy. Third, because there is also environmental damage, because the cars are dismantled and the carcass of the cars is thrown in the countryside, also with enormous damage to the environment".

The text - in the Justice Commission, in the drafting stage, which is an accelerated approval procedure - provides for the introduction of some aggravating circumstances. "We are not adding a crime - Damiani emphasizes - but aggravating circumstances. In particular, those concerning the penalties, which are more severe, therefore from 2 to 6 years. First of all, the certainty of the penalty, because there are cases in which the guilty, immediately arrested, are unfortunately immediately released. There will be no more mitigating circumstances. Another very important aspect is the confiscation of assets for receivers, who are the economic strength of this criminal chain". Damiani hopes that, given the resurgence of the phenomenon, the text can be widely shared, even among the opposition forces. And that proposals to improve the text arrive in Parliament.