It happened to the commander of the Local Police of the Municipality of Prevalle, in the province of Brescia, who after a long judicial excursus made up of complaints, counter-claims, appeals etc. lasted about six years, he was convicted by the Justice of the Peace of Salò for having interfered in hunting checks by four volunteer hunting guards of the WWF and the Lipu. The facts date back to December 2006 when the traffic policeman was hunting in the company of some friends; during the hunting day, the group of hunters was approached by four Volunteer Hunting Guards of the WWF and the Lipu who wanted to carry out a hunting control.
In particular, according to the controllers, one of the hunters had just killed a bird belonging to a protected species but the traffic policeman intervened at this point by presenting himself as a judicial police officer and thus opposing the hunting control; according to the policeman the operators of the two associations were not entitled to carry out the verification therefore he invited the hunting companions not to be identified.
According to the documents presented in court, the interference of the traffic policeman had been stuffed with threats of complaint and with a general intimidating attitude towards the guards so as to request the intervention of the Carabinieri on the spot who had apparently resolved the disputes and identified all the present. Shortly after, however, it seems that the traffic policeman had again threatened the volunteers and insulted them heavily so that they filed a formal complaint and the traffic policeman was subsequently denounced on the loose.
After almost six years, the Justice of the Peace of Salò, competent for the territory in question, decided to accept the reasons of the voluntary guards and sentenced the traffic policeman to pay a fine of 600 euros, of 1.500 euros as compensation for damages for each of the four operators who had formed a civil party in the proceeding and for the payment of court costs. The judges in fact decided not to accept the justification presented by the traffic policeman according to which the voluntary guards were not recognizable as such, nor identifiable, during the intervention.
19 March 2013