The Finger and the Moon

act for freedom

From the operation ‘Cervantes’ to the correlated strategies of dominion

Dominion is vindictive
No less are the oppressed

Translated by Barbara Stefanelli

This pamphlet is a contribution to explaining what the so called operation ‘Cervantes is about, following which a great number of anarchists have been under investigation for conspiracy for nearly two years. Four of them have been in jail since July 2004, whereas another five were arrested in May 2005 and released in February 2006. Even if the charge of conspiracy was dropped on the occasion of the last hearing (February 2006) and the anarchists thus accused were cleared, Tombolino was sentenced to 9 years imprisonment and found guilty of sending a letter bomb that caused a cop to lose two fingers as he opened it (an episode that occurred in 2003); Simone was sentenced to 6 years and accused of an explosive attack against the Viterbo court (2004); Massimo was sentenced to 3 years for an attack against a McDonald’s restaurant. None of these accusations is backed up with any real evidence.
What kept these comrades in prison was the will of dominion that is trying to take revenge on its sworn enemies.
Laws, created and imposed in defence of the interests of the ruling class, are nothing more than instruments in the service of those who practise oppression. The attacks of repression, therefore, that is to say the law itself, not only strikes those who are behind bars today, but like a collective scourge, they strike all of us. This is why fighting back without wasting time is an absolute necessity, which everyone must accomplish according to their own aspirations and means, passion and anger.

Do you think that two or three bunches of clouds
are little things in the summer sky?
In a flash they can spread everywhere…
Lightning then strikes, thunder roars,
and rain pours everywhere.
Do not say that we are few,
just say that we are.
LEE KWANG SU

What follows is the text of the order of search and investigation that was addressed to dozens of comrades in various areas in Italy at dawn on July 27 2004. Four of them were arrested. Arrest warrants were issued by preliminary investigation judge (GIP) Muntoni.

Public Prosecutor’s Office
Court of Rome
Search warrant

(Articles 250 and following of the penal code)
The public prosecutor orders search and investigation of…………..following articles 270 and 270bis of the penal code. The above mentioned… together with others, was promoting, forming, organising and taking part in a subversive association aimed at subverting with violence the economic and social order of the State, and at committing acts of violence to subvert the democratic order (such as acts of sabotage, attacks to people and property, and other), and which was structured according to the subversive scheme of double level (a clear and apparently legal level and a hidden and practically illegal level). The association was formed by ‘AFFINITY GROUPS’.
The latter:
- Acted on a local basis; were characterized by the highest degree of intimacy, knowledge and reciprocal trust between the members and were open to anyone who agreed with their project;
- Were connected to one another by informal communication and bound together by a common project of ‘small actions’ of attack against institutions through armed struggled carried out with criterions of simplicity, direct action and a generalised attack against the State and the symbols of the EU;
- Had different names but operated under a common alliance called informal anarchist federation (Federazione Anarchica Informale or FAI);
- Were engaged in mutual assistance characterized by:
. revolutionary solidarity towards arrested and/or hiding comrades;
. adhesion to REVOLUTIONARY CAMPAIGNS carried out anonymously by
individuals or affinity groups;
. mutual adhesion to actions of struggle.
In Rome, Viterbo, Arezzo and other towns (sites of local affinity groups, of the targeted objectives and of informal meetings of the various groups). From summer 2003 till now.


OPERATION CERVANTES
The so-called operation ‘Cervantes’, orchestrated by the R.O.S (carabinieri special unit) and by the D.I.G.O.S. (political police), ordered by home secretary Pisanu and executed by Roman antiterrorism judges, such as public prosecutors Vitello, De Falco and Capaldo, and co-ordinated by judge Ionta, focuses its ‘attention’ on the ‘insurrectionist-anarchist’ movement: the accusation states that there exists an association ‘aiming at subverting with violence the economic and social order of the State’ and attributes penal responsibility to a number of individuals for various attacks against dominion.
As judge Marini’s trial had concluded, the inquisitors having obtained a sentence from the Court of Cassation condemning eight comrades for various crimes and accused five of them of belonging to an armed and subversive association aiming at committing acts of terrorism, once again the theorem of the double level was put forward: ‘a clear and apparently legal level and a hidden and practically illegal level’, which would refer to a well structured organisation pivoting on the constitution of affinity groups.
Police and judges, therefore, tried to connect the investigation to what they call ‘the complex phenomenon of insurrectionist-anarchism’, and they also took the trouble to establish its origins. This new investigation, in fact, makes reference to an armed group called Revolutionary Action that operated in Italy at the end of the Seventies, and to a great number of writings by anarchist comrade Alfredo Bonanno, who is today in jail following Marini’s trial and who has been identified as ‘the ideologist of insurrectionist-anarchism’ since that investigation. In particular, the inquisitors used a number of extracts from a text, ‘Affinity and Informal Organisation’. Moreover they mentioned the latter as the new text of reference of the ‘Insurrectionist-Anarchist Revolutionary Organisation’, and in doing so they seem to have ‘forgotten’ that the hypothesis of the above-mentioned organisation had already been dismantled in the first grade of the Marini trial; through this new investigation they are attempting to propose the same accusation on ideological grounds.
And soon they found what they call the ‘generating source’ of the current activity of the most radical part of the anarchist movement in Italy, the one that in this penal procedure has been identified as the Informal Anarchist Federation.
It is important to point out that this operation is part of a general project of repression against those who practise direct action. Hence it is backed by a series of investigations and arrests that strike a great number of comrades all over Italy.
At the beginning of June the houses of a dozen comrades and the site of the radical ecological group ‘Il Silvestre’ are searched in Pisa. It is the investigation of the C.O.R. (Revolutionary Offensive Cells), a group that since July 2003 have claimed a series of explosive attacks against members of Alleanza Nazionale party [The Italian fascist party, translator’s note], journalists, institutional unionists, job agencies and the yard where a carabinieri headquarters was being built. Alessio is arrested immediately, whereas another four comrades are arrested in the evening. A comrade is released after two days, while house arrest is conceded to the others after four days in prison. During the summer other comrades from Pisa are searched and arrested. Alessio and Willy are still in prison today following the C.O.R. investigation; Francesco, who was under house arrest, resolved to escape and he is now on hiding [He was recaptured on May 11 2005 in Barcelona and extradited to Italy in January 2006. Willy and Alessio were put under house arrest after a few months, translator’s note]. In Genoa, at the beginning of the summer, during one of the usual police raids against immigrants, two comrades, Errico and Paolo decide to intervene. They are arrested and accused of resistance, and of insulting and attacking public officials. After three days they are put under house arrest, and eventually released, but they must sign every day at the police station.
On June 12 three comrades of ‘Circolo Fraria’ in Cagliari (Sardinia), Carlo, Luca and Vinicio, are arrested and accused of having set fire to the site of Forza Italia [The Italian prime minister’s party, translator’s note] in Quartu Sant’Elena (Cagliari). Another ten comrades and ‘Circolo Fraria’ site are searched. The latter is closed down for sixty days following a 1931 law. The official reason is that ‘the members of Fraria have caused serious inconvenience to public order and security and have created a widespread state of alarm. It is strongly believed that they might plan further and more serious crimes’ (…)’. The order that stated the closure of ‘Circolo Fraria’ is delayed for another two months. The three anarchists are put under house arrest after a month and a half.
At the end of June Luigi, Stefano, Marco, Mattia, Massimo and Lorenzo from Rovereto are arrested and taken to Trento prison, following a fight with a group of fascists that had occurred two years before. A great number of houses are also searched. After a few days the six comrades start a protest in order to put an end to their isolation and to be released (they refuse to go out in the yard and to take showers). A week later they are released.
On June 11 Salvatore is arrested in Lecce following riots outside and inside the concentration camp for immigrants ‘Regina Pacis’, where a revolt had been broken during a demo in solidarity with the immigrants. After two days he is put under house arrest.
In October, following a Molotov device attack against a carabinieri station in Catania (Sicily), anarchist comrade Giuseppe is arrested. After four months in prison he is eventually released due to a legal flaw.
This pamphlet is a contribution to exposing what the latest attack of repression, the so-called operation ‘Cervantes’, is like and to examining a series of other facts following which a number of comrades are still under investigation for belonging to a subversive association aimed at committing acts of terrorism, and four of them are being held in prison. Our intent, even through this pamphlet, is to bring solidarity to all the comrades hit by repression. We want that, with active solidarity, new forces can be found to help in the resistance against the attacks of dominion and to destroy the current social-political-police apparatus.
No self-pity: we do not expect anything from our sworn enemies, nor will we claim anyone’s innocence.
As we are extraneous to the moral and legal concepts of ‘guilty’ and innocent’, we do not recognize as our interlocutors the State nor its courts, its judges, its codes and its laws, that only condemn or absolve.
The law, thought and imposed in order to defend the interests of the ruling class, is just an instrument serving those who practise oppression.
The attacks of the repression, therefore, i.e. the law itself, not only hit those who are behind prison bars today, but like a collective scourge, they strike all of us. That is why fighting back without wasting time is an absolute necessity, which everybody has to accomplish according to his or her own aspirations and means, passion and anger.
To Tittarello, Sergio, Simone, Tombolino.
To all our comrades in prison.
To all the prisoners.
Soon again with us!



CHRONOLOGY
Here is a chronology of the events that took place from the explosive attack against the Cervantes institute to today (April 2005). We have used communiqués, newspaper articles and most importantly the contribution of the comrades who have directly experienced the events.
June 17 2003 – During the night an explosive device detonates close to the Spanish Cervantes Institute in Rome. The explosion damages the entrance door and other structures of the building. The device is made from about 500 grams of explosive substance placed inside a pressure cooker along with bolts and a primer triggered with a timer. The action is claimed by the ‘5 C’, ‘Cellule contro il Capitale, il Carcere i suoi Carcerieri e le sue Celle’ (Cells against capital, prison, jailers and cells). This is an extract of the claim:

‘TODAY, 17/6/2003, AT 4AM WE LASHED AT THE CERVANTES INSTITUTE, ONE OF THE SYMBOLS OF SPANISH DOMINION THAT EXIST IN ITALY. THROUGH THIS ACTION WE STRONGLY SUPPORT THE CLAIMS OF THE FIES PRISONERS WHO ARE STILL STRUGGLING WITH DIGNITY. WE THINK THAT ANY INDIVIDUAL WHO IS NOT TAMED BY THE FALSE WELL-BEING OFFERED BY DEMOCRACY HAS TO EXPRESS HIS/HER ANGER IN DEEDS AND IN SOLIDARITY TO THE OPPRESSED. WE WANT TO REMIND THOSE WHO ATTEND THIS INSTITUTE AND WHO ARE ACCOMPLICES OF THE TORTURE INFLICTED INSIDE THE PRISONS OF THE SPANISH STATE THAT THEY ARE NOW AWARE ENOUGH OF THE GRAVITY OF THEIR INDIFFERENCE, THEY NO LONGER HAVE ANY ALIBIS. THEY MUST BE READY TO ACCEPT THE CONSEQUENCES OF THAT. (…) WE DO NOT THINK THAT A SINGLE ACTION IS A VICTORY, SO WE WILL KEEP ON DISTURBING YOUR DREAMS, YOUR ECONOMIC INTERESTS, AND YOUR TRANQUILLITY, WHICH IS BASED ON THE CERTAINTY OF A FALSE IMPUNITY. YOU WILL SOON TASTE THE CONSEQUENCES OF YOUR GUILTY INDIFFERENCE’.

October 2 2003 – Three explosive parcels are sent respectively to the Ministry of Work (where it detonates), to the offices of Sardinia region in Rome and to the carabinieri station in Stampace (Cagliari, Sardinia).
October 4 2003 – A European summit discussing the EU constitution is held in Rome. In spite of the fact that the town is under siege, a group of comrades attack a number of targets: they try to set fire to a job agency, ‘Adecco’, and damage a few banks and petrol stations. Police officers who stop 32 people are also attacked.
A carabinieri infiltrator is recognized and beaten by three masked comrades. Owing to the massive presence of cameras, not only journalists immediately capture images of the action, but the latter are also broadcast in the Internet. It is precisely following this kind of evidence (videos and photos) that public prosecutor Vitello orders the search and arrest of a few comrades who are supposed to have assaulted the carabinieri infiltrator Massimo Boraccini on October 4 in Rome.
October 8 2003 – An explosive device is found and defused at the site of the Spanish airline company ‘Iberia’ in Parioli area (Rome). The device is formed by a pressure cooker containing nitrate and connected to a timer by electric wires. The action is claimed by the ‘Armed Cells for International Solidarity’:
‘SOLIDARITY TO THE COMRADES ARRESTED IN VALENCIA AND BARCELONA AND TO EVERYONE WHO STRUGGLES AGAINST THIS SYSTEM OF EXPLOITATION INSIDE AND OUTSIDE THE PRISONS.
IN MEMORY OF PACO ORTIZ’.
October 16 2003 – A mail explosive device is sent to the police headquarters in Rome. It is defused before it detonates.
October 18 2003 – Following public prosecutor Vitello’s order, ROS and DIGOS search the houses of four comrades in Rome and Viterbo area. The latter are considered responsible for the incidents that occurred on October 4 in Rome during the demo against the EU summit. A comrade, Massimo Leonardi, is arrested and accused of having beaten the carabinieri infiltrator.
The evidence justifying the arrest is given by videos and photos published in various newspapers, which show three masked demonstrators beating a cop infiltrated in the march.
October 21 2003 – Massimo refuses to be questioned by the preliminary investigation judge. Meantime the forensic police department examines a few objects that had been seized from Massimo’s house on October 18. These objects are eventually handed to the R.O.S. as they are considered ‘relevant’ to the investigation on the mail explosive devices sent to Rome and Sardinia on October 2. Following these facts, a hideous slanderous campaign is carried out by the media against Massimo.
October 22 2003 – During a demo in solidarity with Massimo in Cagliari (Sardinia), fights with the cops occur, 14 demonstrators are stopped and 3 of them are arrested. A comrade is injured in the head and must be taken to hospital. The morning after a summary trial is to be held. It is postponed to January 13.
October 24 2003 – An explosive device formed by a few petrol cans filled with inflammables is found outside the entrance door of the site of the Social Services for Adults Centre (C.S.S.A.) in Viterbo, a structure belonging to the ministry of Justice that is engaged in the ‘rehabilitation’ of prisoners.
About 50 comrades demonstrate in solidarity to Massimo and show the banner: ‘Free Massimo, Fire to all prisons’.
October 25 2003 – A great number of comrades gather outside Regina Coeli prison in Rome, where Massimo had been taken the day before. The deployment of anti-riot cops, DIGOS and carabinieri is massive. When they reach the prison, the comrades learn that Massimo has been moved to Rebibbia prison, following the procedure typical of the isolation regime he is held under: blindfolded, handcuffed and with chains to his feet. The comrades, who have come from various Italian areas, move towards Rebibbia prison in small groups, followed by the police. They start distributing leaflets in front of the tube station close to Rebibbia, surrounded by DIGOS and carabinieri in plain clothes. As soon as the comrades move towards Tiburtina (a main road that leads to Rebibbia prison), anti-riot cops attack and start kidnapping demonstrators. A few comrades manage to escape by throwing down some rubbish skips and launching firecrackers against the cops. In the end 14 comrades are arrested and taken to Regina Coeli and Rebibbia prisons. They are released two days later. The trial is fixed for the fifth of February
November 2 2003 – In Mar del Plata (Argentina) a few writings in solidarity to Massimo appear on the building of the Italian embassy.
November 3 2003 – An explosive device is found at the prefect’s office in Cagliari. The action is claimed the day after by the A.S.A.I. (Anonymous Sardinian Insurrectionist-Anarchists), which send a leaflet to the police headquarters claiming Massimo’s freedom.
November 4 2003 – Writings in solidarity to Massimo appear in front of the Italian embassy in Buenos Aires (Argentina).
The court refuses to concede house arrest to Massimo. Meanwhile, two explosive packages are sent, one to the police headquarters in Viterbo (which is defused)) and the other to the carabinieri station in Viale Libia in Rome. The latter blows up in the hands of marshal Stefano Sindona, chief of the station, who loses two fingers. The two devices were made by an envelope containing a videocassette box with about 100 grams of gunpowder inside and a broken light bulb connected to a 9-voltage battery. The primer was made from a clothes peg with a few drawing pins attached to it and taken apart by a plastic stripe stuck to the inside of a corner of the envelope.
November 5 2003 – A mannequin dressed in a police uniform is found hanging in the park of a super store, which is immediately evacuated. Bomb disposal cops are called to the spot. The episode is thought to be in relation to a few writings in solidarity to Massimo that were left in the area.
November 10 2003 – Another mail explosive device, sent to the site of the daily ‘Il Corriere di Viterbo’, is defused by bomb disposal officers in Rome. The mail was addressed to journalist Gianluigi Basilietti, and was made using a CD container. The investigators put forward the hypothesis of a ‘punishment’ against Basilietti, who had written a few articles about the explosive devices of October 4, maintaining that the action could be related to Massimo’s arrest.
November 14 2003 –During the night a few gas bombs filled with petrol blow up outside five banks in front of the site of ‘New Democracy’ party in Athens. The claim, among other things, expresses solidarity to the comrades arrested in Italy.
November 26 2003 – The front door of Atri court (Teramo) is set on fire. On the outside wall is written: ‘Free Massimo Leonardi’.
December 2 2003 – An explosive device detonates outside the front door of the provincial palace in Cagliari. The action is claimed in a leaflet signed A.S.A.I., which says "Massimo a forosa" (Free Massimo, in Sardinian).
December 3 2003 – A great number of searches are carried out in the houses of a number of comrades and in two squats in Rome, Torre Maura and La Cascina. The latter is evicted the same day. It seems that the searches are related to the arrest of anarchist Marco Ferruzzi (Tombolino) from Viterbo, which occurs in the morning in Naples. Marco is accused of being one of the three people who had beaten the cop infiltrated the demo on October 4 in Rome. The evidence is once again a video film. He is taken to Regina Coeli prison in Rome.
December 3 2003 – An explosive device detonates outside the building housing the Provincial offices in Cagliari (Sardina). A few hours earlier an anti-subversion summit with police and DIGOS high officers of the island and the deputy chief of the police of State Antonio Manganelli was held.
December 4 2003 – Public prosecutor Vitello gives the ok for conceding house arrest to Massimo, a decision that must be ratified by preliminary investigation judge Finiti.
December 6 2003 – A demo in solidarity to Massimo and Marco is held in Viterbo.
Preliminary investigation judge Finiti refuses to notify house arrest to Massimo.
December 18 2003 – Preliminary investigation judge Finiti finally ratifies house arrest for Massimo, who is taken home two days later.
December 21 2003 – At around 10pm an explosive device made by a pressure cooker, camping gas cannisters and a timer blows up inside a rubbish skip in Bologna in the area where EU commission president Romano Prodi lives. Soon after another device detonates inside a skip close to the first.
December 23 2003 – A communiqué claiming the explosive action carried out in Romano Prodi’s area is sent to the daily ‘La Repubblica’.
‘2 PRESSURE COOKERS HAVE BEEN PLACED IN TWO DIFFERENT PLACES AND MADE TO BLOW UP AVOIDING ANY INCONVENIENCE TO INNOCENT PEOPLE WHO LIVE IN THE SAME AREA WHERE THE DEN OF ROMANO PRODI AND HIS FAMILY IS. THE PIG MUST KNOW THAT WE ARE GETTING CLOSER TO HIM AND HIS MATES. SEE YOU SOON’.
In the second part of the claim, ‘Open letter to the anarchist and antiauthoritarian movement’, the project of F.A.I. (Informal Anarchist Federation) is exposed. The letter is signed by F.A.I./Cooperativa Artigiana Fuoco e Affini occasionalmente spettacolare (F.A.I./Fire and Similar Craftwork Cooperative, occasionally spectacular), F.A.I./Brigata 20 luglio (F.A.I./July 20 Brigade), F.A.I./Cellule Contro il Capitale, il Carcere, i suoi Carcerieri e le sue Celle (F.A.I./Cells against Capital, Prison, Jailers and Cells) and F.A.I./Solidarieta’ internazionale (F.A.I./International Solidarity).

OPEN LETTER TO THE ANARCHIST AND ANTIAUTHORITARIAN MOVEMENT
As the consolidation of the EU is going on quickly and assuming all the wickedness of the political, economic, military-repressive choices of the various States, and as a European constitution that re-establishes and legitimates EU dominion is about to be ratified, the first Informal Anarchist Federation struggle campaign has started. We could not deny ourselves the pleasure of actively criticising the six-month’s Italian presidency of the EU, which is coming to an end. We are aware that, behind any official rhetoric, the decisions that have been taken during the last months will bring about new practises of exploitation and dominion. In Fortress Europe, where not only the borders between exploiters and exploited are defended with arms, we oppose trade agreements and the militarization of the territory with free agreements between those who struggle against dominion, as we want to demonstrate that not only is the struggle possible, but it is also an absolute necessity. Today we have attacked the repressive apparatus that plays the democratic farce and that will bring the main characters and institutions to the new European order:
-The various police departments, which will soon be backed by a European army, besides their traditional task of internal repression, have the basic mission of filtering the huge masses of poor people who want to step into Fortress Europe. In fact, only the workforce needed by the bosses is allowed to get in, the others are sent back to be exploited in their countries of origin.
-A prison system, which is more and more crowded and widespread, is consolidating its main role in repression. It is the last bastion in the defence of the system, whereas starvation wages and the last remnants of welfare are not sufficient to stem the anger of the exploited.
-Bureaucrats and politicians are always ready to plan and promote any adjustment that serves to keep the system alive.
The actions carried out today, as well as the ones that will follow, are planned so as to avoid the possibility of striking innocent people. We will carry on demonstrating our profound hatred for the State and capital and our unbounded love for a world free from the dominion of men over men and of men over nature. We are not the only ones, nor are we the last. In every street, in the day and in the night, we see that the same destructive-constructive tension for a better world is growing. We were in Genoa, we were in Saloniki, we were in the streets of Italy last night, and tomorrow we will be in new streets to fight the misery of the existent.
Attack and destroy those responsible for repression and exploitation!
Attack and destroy prisons, banks, courts and police stations!
Revolt is contagious and can be reproduced!
Social war against capital and the State!
WHO WE ARE
We have created the Informal Anarchist Federation, that is to say a federation formed either by groups of action or by single individuals, in order to go beyond the limits implied in single projects and to experiment the real potentialities of informal organisation. We strongly believe that only a chaotic and horizontal organisation, without bosses, authorities or central committees taking decision, can fulfil our need for freedom here and now. Our goal is to have an organisation reflecting the view of the anarchist society, which we struggle for. This is intended as an instrument and not as the copy of some old armed party or as an organisation looking for adepts. If it were not an instrument to be used for testing the efficiency of informal organisation and its capacity of strengthening quality and continuity of the revolutionary action, it would be absolutely useless and would certainly die out. Through widespread actions it is possible to conciliate organisation and theoretical/practical debate on the one hand, and the anonymity of groups/individuals on the other. Actions, in fact, besides bringing their specific message of destruction/construction, also propose other kinds of message, such as the ones implied in their methods and instruments. In this case the damage caused does not matter. We are aware that it will not be a well-armed minority group that will stir up revolution, and we are determined not to postpone our insurrection waiting for everybody to be ready: we are more and more convinced that a simple direct action against institutions is more effective than thousands of words.
FEDERATION because of its widespread horizontal structure, that is to say federation of groups or individuals, free and equal men and women bond together by common practises of attack against dominion and aware that mutual support and revolutionary solidarity are instruments of freedom. Relationships inside the federation are stable and flexible at the same time; they evolve continuously thanks to the ideas and practices brought in by new individuals and groups that will join. We do not want any democratic federation, as this would involve representatives, delegates, official meetings, committees, and organs implying the election of leaders, charismatic figures and the imposition of specialists of speech. In the informal federation, communication must be based on a horizontal and anonymous debate, which will come out of widespread practice (claims of actions) and theories through the means of communication of the movement. In other words, the meeting will be substituted by an anonymous and horizontal debate between groups or individuals who communicate through practice. The federation is our strength, that is to say the strength of groups or individuals that help one another through a well-defined pact of mutual support.
ANARCHIST because we want the destruction of capital and the State. We want a world where only freedom and self-organisation ‘dominate’, and a society where the exploitation of men over men and of men over nature does not exist. We strongly oppose any Marxist cancer, which is nothing more than a fascinating and dangerous siren that claims freedom for the oppressed but actually denies the possibility of a free society and just substitutes one dominion with another.
INFORMAL because we do not believe in vanguards nor do we think that we are an enlightened active minority. We just want to live as anarchists here and now and this is why we consider the informal organisation as the only kind of organisation capable of preventing the creation of any authoritarian and bureaucratic mechanism. It allows us to keep our independence as individuals and/or groups and to resist power with continuity. The Informal Anarchist Organisation practices the armed struggle but it refuses classic monolithic organisations implying a base, regular and irregular members, columns, executive cadres, huge amounts of money and living in hiding. We think that this kind of structure is an easy target for power. In fact, an infiltrated cop or an informer is sufficient to have the whole organisation or a good part of it collapse like a house of cards. On the contrary, as the informal organisation is formed by 1000 individuals or groups that do not know one another (as they recognize one another through the actions they carry out and the mutual support bonding them), if by some unfortunate chance infiltrators or informers should come out, this would affect a single group without spreading to the others. Furthermore, whoever takes part into the Informal organisation is a militant only when preparing and carrying out an action. The organisation, therefore, does not affect the entire life and projects of the comrades so that all kinds of armed-struggle sectarianism are avoided. Once we are well rooted, power will find it very difficult to destroy us.
The pact of mutual support is the strong point of the Anarchist Informal Organisation and it pivots on three key points based on the above mentioned anarchist revolutionary project, and that come into play when individuals or groups decide to join the Anarchist Informal Organisation:
1. REVOLUTIONARY SOLIDARITY. Each group of action in the Informal Anarchist Organisa-tion is engaged in showing revolutionary solidarity to comrades who are arrested or are on hiding. This solidarity will show itself mainly through armed action and the attack against men and structures responsible for the imprisonment of comrades. Solidarity will always be practiced as an indispensable feature of an anarchist way of life and action. Of course we do not refer to legal and technical support: bourgeois society offers a sufficient number of lawyers, social workers and priests, which means that revolutionists can be engaged in another kind of activity.
2. REVOLUTIONARY CAMPAIGNS. When a group or individual starts a revolutionary campaign through the deeds and related communiqués, other groups and individuals in the Anarchist Informal Organisation will follow according to their methods and time. Each group or individual can launch a struggle campaign on specific targets through one or more actions signed by the single group or individual and by the claim of the Federation. If a campaign is not agreed by the other groups, the critic will show itself through actions and communiqués that will contribute to correcting or discussing it.
3. COMMUNICATION BETWEEN GROUPS OR INDIVIDUALS. The groups of action in the Anarchist Informal Organisation are not required to know one another. This will prevent repression striking them and possible leaders or bureaucrats from emerging. Communication between groups or individuals is carried out through the actions and through the channels of the movement without them know one another directly.
P.S. Any reference to the FAI Italian Transport Workers Federation (Federazione Autotrasportatori Italiani), to the FAI Italian Anarchist Federation (Federazione Anarchica Italiana) and to the FAI Italian Fund for the Environment (Fondo Italiano per l’Ambiente) is a pure coincidence. We apologise to the people concerned.
-A few comrades from Bologna are eventually investigated.
December 27 2003 - A mail explosive device is sent to Romano Prodi’s house in Bologna and is addressed to the wife of the latter. The device produces a flame that ignites in the MP’s hands.
December 29 2003 - A mail explosive device is sent to the European Central Bank in Frankfurt (Germany) and is addressed to his director Jean Claude Trichet.
-Another mail explosive device is sent to the site of the Europol in Ajax (Holland).
December 30 2003 – A mail explosive device addressed to the director of Eurojust, the new European Power of Attorney, is found in Ajax.
-A mail explosive device blows up in the head office of the European Popular Party in Bruxelles (Belgium); another one is addressed to the European responsible for the Spanish Popular party.
-A mail explosive device blows up in the head office of the Labour party in the site of the European Socialist Party in Manchester (England).
January 8 2004 – Tombolino is conceded house arrest.
January 9 2004 – Massimo is notified that he must face trial on January 27 for beating the cop.
January 13 2004 – Gathering in solidarity to the comrades arrested on October 22 in Cagliari following a demo in solidarity to Massimo Leonardi. The hearing is postponed to April 7.
January 17 2004 – Massimo is released, but he must sign at the police station every day.
January 19 2004 – In the night an explosive device blows up outside Viterbo court. Two armoured doors situated at a distance of 15 metres are damaged. The air conditioning system and the recording equipment used during hearings are also seriously damaged. The device is made by 500 grams of explosive. Here is the text of the leaflet claiming the action.
‘VITERBO, JANUARY 19. WE HAVE LASHED AT THIS COURT WHERE STATE POWER GUARANTEES THE VIOLENCE OF THE OPPRESSORS OVER THE OPPRESSED EVERY DAY. IN NOVEMBER WE HAD STRUCK THE LOCAL SITE OF THE C.S.S.A., WHERE THE SAME POWER CONTROLS AND BLACKMAILS PRISONERS IN ORDER TO OFFER LOW COST LABOUR TO BIG AND SMALL BOSSES. POWER SENDS PEOPLE TO PRISON AND THEN CREATES DIVISIONS AMONG THEM AND ENSURES PEACE IN THE JAILS BY GIVING PRIVILEGES TO SOME OF THEM. THROUGH THESE TWO ACTIONS WE GREET ALL PRISONERS KIDNAPPED BY JAILERS. ATTACKING POWER IS POSSIBLE AND NECESSARY, UNTIL THE END OF ALL EXPLOITATION, UNTIL ANARCHY’.
-At 5am some comrades’ houses in Viterbo are searched.
February 2 2004 – The preliminary investigation judge concedes three hours’ freedom to Tombolino three days a week, but under restrictions.
February 10 2004 – Massimo is notified an order of censorship on his mail.
February 17 2004 – 40 houses are searched in Rome, Latina and Viterbo by the Digos, which also notify 40 warrants of investigation for conspiracy (articles 270 and 270bis of the Italian penal code). The investigation, led by public prosecutor Vitello and companions, aims at striking various comrades who had taken part in public events such as gatherings, distribution of leaflets, and demos against prison and in solidarity to prisoners. It is a clear repressive operation against any form of solidarity shown by the most radical part of the movement in the region. In fact, various groups and different people are all considered part of a ‘subversive association’. Furthermore the media pay great attention to this police operation, which is presented as a successful attempt to find the responsible for the latest explosive attacks. The intent of the investigators is to intimidate anyone who takes part in public events, to control the movement as a whole and to lay the foundations of further waves of repression.
March 19 2004 – In the night an incendiary device is found outside the door of a butcher’s shop in Arezzo, which had previously been daubed with red paint. The device was made by 4 camping gas bombs and two plastic bottles containing inflammatory liquid, which were connected to 4 primers made by matches. The action is claimed by ‘Animal and Human Liberation of the Earth’:
‘IN THE NIGHT BETWEEN 17TH AND 18TH MARCH WE DAUBED THE WINDOWS OF 20 BUTCHER’S SHOPS WITH PAINT. WE RESTRICTED OURSELVES TO DOING A SYMBOLIC ACTION AGAINST THOSE WHO MAKE A PROFIT FROM DEATH AND SUFFERING. THE FOLLOWING NIGHT WE PUT AN INCENDIARY DEVICE OUTSIDE CORSO CAVOUR BUTCHER’S SHOP. UNFORTUNATELY, FOR REASONS WE DO NOT KNOW, OUR INTENT TO ATTACK A SYMBOL OF MERCIFICATION OF LIFE WAS NOT SUCCESSFUL. WE ARE GOING TO STRIKE WHOEVER DECIDES NOT TO RESPECT OUR MOTHER EARTH AND THE LIFE THAT SHE GAVE US. FOR THE ANIMAL AND HUMAN LIBERATION OF THE EARTH’.
March 30 2004 – Two explosive devices blow up outside Sturla police station in Genoa. The explosions follow each other in a few minutes. The action is claimed by the Anarchist Informal Federation/July 20 Brigade. The text of the claim, which is sent to a few newspapers, is seized by the police and is not made known.
April 2 2004 – Two mail explosive devices addressed to two prison high officers are intercepted in a post office in Rome. The action is claimed by the Anarchist Informal Federation/Armed Cells for International Solidarity. The press publishes only a few parts of the claim, where the DAP is considered as the responsible for violence and exploitation over prisoners and Baleno [Edoardo Massari] is mentioned.
April 5 2004 – The first hearing of the trial against Massimo and Tombolino, accused of having beaten a cop, is held. Massimo is sentenced to 1 year and 2 months’ imprisonment, whereas Tombolino is sentenced to 1 year.
April 7 2004 – Tombolino, who was under house arrest, is released but he must sign every day at the police station.
May 20 2004 – Anarchist comrade Sergio Stefani from Arezzo is arrested in Rome. He is accused of having carried out an incendiary attack against a butcher’s shop in Arezzo on the night of March 19. Another comrade, Agnese, is notified of an order compelling her to stay at home from 9pm to 7am.
May 27 2004 – Two incendiary devices made from petrol, camping gas bombs and a primer are put outside the local Blockbuster shop. One of them catches fire and damages the entrance door and the sign. In the neighbourhood a claim written in solidarity to Sergio is left. The investigation on this attack is led by public prosecutor Ionta and by the antiterrorism squad from Rome.
May 29 2004 – A gathering in solidarity to Sergio and Agnese is held in Arezzo.
- A great number of butcher’s shop doors are blocked in Barcelona, and writings in solidarity to Sergio are left in the neighbourhoods.
June 4 2004 – Sergio, who is in isolation in Regina Coeli prison (Rome), writes the following communiqué:
‘I’m writing as I heard that a few comrades in Italy and in Spain have carried out actions against various symbols of dominion and left the writing "Free Sergio". Structures of the dominion of man over animals, like butcher’s shops and fish shops in Barcelona as well as a Blockbuster shop in Latina were struck. I’d like to thank the comrades who made these actions and those against Benetton shops in Arezzo, which were dedicated to me, as I was told, and those who were close to me with their letters, in particular Finn and Swiss comrades. I’d also like to reassure everybody about my condition. It is true that I’ve been in a jail for two weeks under a regime of special surveillance (as explicitly requested by the national prison authority!), but it is also true that I’m in fact free. I’ll be detained as long as the investigation on attacks against butcher’s shops in Arezzo comes to an end. The accusation is pretty serious: manufacture and use of war weapons (!!!), which implies from 3 to 12 years’ imprisonment. The real reason for this detention, however, is my ideas. As it can be easily understood from the public prosecutor’s delirium, largely shared by the preliminary investigation judge, my imprisonment is justified by little, ridiculous and irrelevant evidence; moreover it is justified by the fact that they found in my possession "papers related to anarchist and animalist groups", that the crimes I’m accused of were committed following a "precise ideological choice" and that a note from the DIGOS was addressed to me. But as I’m prisoner because of my ideas, I’ll stay free as long as the latter remain firm. And my ideas will never stagger as long as there are comrades who keep on struggling and are close to me. Let’s keep on struggling against all forms of dominion and exploitation because any single act of liberation, first of all personal liberation, is worth the risk of all their prisons.
A free comrade detained in Regina Coeli".
June 26 2004 – Sergio is conceded house arrest in his home in Rome.
July 1 2004 – ‘This afternoon the carabinieri have notified the date of the trial of Sergio and Agnese, which is to be held on July 5 in Arezzo. It will be a summary procedure.
It is disgusting that the cops have conceded the "privilege" of 8 days house arrest to Sergio, and on Sunday night they are going to lock him in a police van in order to drive him to Arezzo for the trial. It is quite astonishing that a summary procedure is applied 4 months after the facts, whereas such a procedure is normally used for those caught in the act or for defendants who plead guilty. A special law, however, also allows the procedure to be applied when arms and explosives are involved. The clear intent of the public prosecutor is to put a quick end to this case, before the summer holidays, so that he can go to the seaside after having sentenced two more people. In his papers he claims that there exists "reasonable certainty" about Sergio and Agnese being guilty. So he will push for a conviction and will be supported by about ten witnesses (almost all of them are cops) in order to achieve a "brilliant conclusion" of a case that has shocked the sleepy town of Arezzo’.
A few Sergio and Agnese’s friends and comrades
July 5 2004 – At the opening of the trial against Sergio and Agnese, the lawyers requested the introduction of a normal procedure instead of the farce of the summary one. Luckily they obtained it and the date of the hearing has now to be fixed. This is a small but important step forward, considering that the inquisitors want Sergio and Agnese to be convicted at all costs and as soon as possible. Sergio is still under house arrest, whereas Agnese must live in Arezzo and can’t go out from 12am to 7am.
July 8 2004 – Preliminary investigation judge Marina Finiti notifies the end of the investigation of two anarchists from Soriano and another comrade. The investigation was related to the existence of a subversive association acting from June 17 2003 to the present time in Viterbo, Soriano, Rome and other towns in Italy. According to the judge, the three anarchists "manufactured explosive devices and brought them to Rome in order to subvert the democratic order". On June 17 2003 the ‘Cervantes’ institute was attacked in Rome and the action was claimed by the Five C (Cells against Capital, Prisons, Jailers and their Cells, Cellule contro il Capitale il Carcere, i suoi Carcerieri e le loro Celle).
July 27 2004 – At dawn the operation ‘Cervantes’ starts. The same day a few newspapers ‘announce’ the police raid. Following the same order that had been notified to the three comrades on July 8, a great number of anarchists are searched. The investigation is called ‘Cervantes’ and includes all the attacks that had been carried out in Rome, Viterbo, Arezzo and other towns, that is to say: all the actions claimed by the FAI, an attack against a butcher’s shop in Arezzo, the attacks against a C.S.S.A. site and the court in Viterbo, the mail explosive devices sent in Rome and Viterbo on November 4, anti-prison gatherings, solidarity to pri-soners, etc. 40 warrants of investigation of ‘subversive association’ (art. 270) and of ‘subversive association aimed at carrying out acts of terrorism’ (art 270bis) are notified. Four comrades, Marco Ferruzzi (Tombolino), David Santini (Tittarello), Sergio Stefani and Stefano Del Moro, are arrested. They are accused of belonging to a subversive association and of a series of specific charges all of them related to explosive attacks.
Sergio, who was under house arrest in his parents’ house, is taken to Regina Coeli prison and put in isolation.
August 2 2004 – Sergio writes the following communiqué:
‘I have been refusing to take food since I entered the prison. This is not a hunger strike aimed at obtaining any immediate benefit. I simply do not accept this nth imprisonment, not because of its particularly harsh conditions, which are certainly inflicted on the other comrades too, nor because do I think it is more unfair than theirs, but because it is motivated by an abuse of power and by mere dull violence; I’ m carrying out this form of protest because it is the only one I can undertake in isolation. I won’t highlight how absurd these accusations are, but I think it is very important to point out how the latter aim at striking solidarity between comrades (which is considered as evidence of the existence of an organisation) and the fact that the anarchist and anti-authoritarian movement is engaged in a struggle against prison. It is clear that they want to suffocate the particular characteristics of anyone who hates authority; and it is also clear that we must not let them frighten us and that we must carry on the struggle against their violence.
Solidarity to the arrested comrades (I regret not having met you in a better time and situation).
Solidarity to all the comrades who have been arrested in other countries because of their thirst for freedom and their joy.
Solidarity to all prisoners who have attacked the system, without using rhetoric but just following their instinct, and have spat on the laws that imprisoned their desires.
Their prison will not take away my freedom to enjoy’.
A free comrade in isolation in Regina Coeli
-Tittarello and Tombolino also begin a hunger strike.
August 6 2004 – The lawyers of the four arrested comrades request that the latter be released. Five days later they obtain a negative response, but the reasons for the rejection will be made known only a month and a half later.
August 7 2004 – A gathering is organised outside Regina Coeli prison in solidarity to the comrades arrested on July 27, followed by the distribution of leaflets in the Trastevere area. A comrade who was writing on a wall is blocked by the carabinieri. As the latter attempt to arrest the comrade and the other demonstrators try to block them, a violent attack by the cops starts. Five comrades are arrested. They are released two days later, but are forbidden to go to Rome for one year and must sign at the police station three times a week. The trial, fixed for October 18, is then postponed to February 28 2005.
August 22 2004 – Another gathering in solidarity to Simone, Sergio and all the prisoners in Regina Coeli is organised outside the prison.
August 27 2004 – Tittarello writes the following communiqué from ‘Le Vallette’ prison in Turin:
‘Dear comrades, I’d like to sum up the events that led to my arrest and to that of another three comrades’. I don’t know how many others are accused of belonging to an inexistent subversive association. After spending more than 20 days in prison, I resolved to write down what I think. I am also accused of having put an explosive device outside Viterbo court, together with another comrade who was also arrested.
It seems that the accusations are based on phone tapping. Those who read the order of arrest could not help laughing, as it contains a great number of vulgar lies and mystifications. I don’t intend to analyse the nature of the accusation, especially as I couldn’t be in two different places at the same time. But I want to claim my solidarity towards whoever struggles for a really free society. I want to say that I interrupted the hunger strike after 16 days because my blood test revealed that I could have problems with my kidneys and need to undergo dialysis for the rest of my life. All the same, I accuse the DIGOS of Rome and Viterbo for what they did to us. I accuse the incompetence of the DIGOS from Viterbo and the dirty trick they used against me, as they invented a phone-tapping conversation that never in fact took place. I accuse those who once again plotted against the anarchist movement and boasted that free individuals formed an inexistent subversive association. But, you know, after 7 and more years of searches, numerous bugging devices found in cars and houses and many comrades from Viterbo shadowed by police without any result at all, these geniuses of investigation had no other choice than to appeal to their imagination. They could not keep on playing the fool any longer. And, as technology did not help them much, these Sherlock Holmes who are not worth a penny, created an inexistent subversive association. As if this was not enough, they also falsified phone-tapping conversations so as to finally arrest a few anarchists who had been making their miserable lives difficult for too a long time.
I’m totally indifferent to their accusations. I’ll keep on struggling along with my comrades on the side of the exploited, of those who die at work for the exploiters’ sake, of those who struggle to claim their right to a house, of those who are compelled to flee their countries and find themselves fighting against repression and racism. I’ll keep on struggling on the side of those who are repressed and arrested because they claim a world free from these atrocities. Someone has recently told me that my struggle is right but useless because the power I fight against is so strong that it will crush me. So what should I do? Should I be a coward and stay on my own while others struggle, even knowing that the struggle is right? This would be cowardly and depressing. All this said, I greet and hold all those who have my same desires in their heart.
FUTURE IS OURS’.
Tittarello imprisoned in Le Vallette prison in Turin
August 29 2004 – Sergio interrupts his hunger strike and writes this communiqué:
Regina Coeli 29/08/04
‘I decided to end my hunger strike after 32 days in order to safeguard my health and in response to the appeal of all my comrades and friends.
I want to point out that the end of the hunger strike does not mean that I stopped struggling, and I still don’t accept this imprisonment passively.
I have never appreciated so-called ‘justice’, but this time more than ever I can’t understand what our ‘crimes’ are.
It seems that our crimes are our hatred for any form of dominion and exploitation and our luck for having so many comrades who show solidarity to us. Most importantly, it seems that our main crime is to be anarchist and to claim that not only is the struggle against this oppressive system possible, it is also an absolute necessity.
If there is anything wrong in all this, then I can say that I don’t regret anything at all ever.
I would like to remind my comrades in jail that the prison bars cannot lock up our minds. When we find ourselves in front of the dullness of our jailers, let’s think of the cages that oppress their brains and hearts, and let’s laugh till their ears start bleeding’.
A free comrade in isolation in Regina Coeli
September 2 2004 – The walls of the building housing the Italian vice-consulate in Burgos (Spain) are targeted with red paint and eggs. A writing left on the wall claims the action: In solidarity to anarchist David, Simone, Sergio and Marco kidnapped by the Italian State on July 27 2004, who were on hunger strike in August and who are now detained waiting for some judge to decide about them’.
September 9 2004 – Simone and Sergio are moved to Carinola prison and Palmi prison respectively for security reasons. It seems that this transfer is related to the trial against the new Red Brigade, which will take place a few days after.
September 18 2004 – Solidarity demo outside Le Vallette prison in Turin, where Tittarello is detained.
-A communiqué from Tombolino, who is being held in Poggioreale prison in Naples, is issued:
‘I was arrested on July 27 2004 during an operation carried out by all the species of pigs in existence: R.O.S., DIGOS, carabinieri and police; the vultures the journalists were ready to record the event.
They entered my and my partner’s house at 4am and, as they didn’t found anyone in, they militarised the whole town. Meantime the press agency broadcast the news of an anarchist who had escaped arrest. At 11.30am I was stopped by carabinieri in Torre Del Greco, who said they had to notify an order. Once I got out of the car, I was handcuffed and taken to the carabinieri station. After a few hours and a lot of pressure, they notified me of an arrest warrant from the public prosecutor in Rome, following articles 270 and 270bis. In particular, they accuse me of having manufactured two mail explosive devices and having sent them the one to a carabinieri station in Rome, where a marshal lost two fingers, and the other, which was defused, to the police headquarters in Viterbo. The evidence used to accuse me is, incredibly enough, a letter in my possession containing a drawing (a hand with two fingers missing). The public prosecutor thinks that this is sufficient to establish that I made the mail explosive device and sent it to the carabinieri barracks in Rome.
I claim my innocence as regards the above-mentioned accusations, but I express my solidarity to those who struggle for freedom against the State.
On July 29, after a few days that I was in Poggioreale prison in Naples, I refused to answer the judge’s questions. On July 30 I was notified of an order of censorship on my mail and was taken to the EIV section, where people considered socially dangerous are detained. The aim of the censorship is to keep me isolated and, most importantly, to extrapolate from our writings further pretexts for strengthening their ‘imaginary’ investigations. I know, however, that the passion of my comrades will not allow anyone to rot in jail. This nth judicial frame-up is also going on thanks to the judges who rejected the request for my release that was presented on August 8 2004, but inexplicably they haven’t made known the reasons for the rejection yet. This stalemate prevents me from sending in any other requests for appeal. In other words, the judges are taking time in order to find new inexistent evidence.
In the section where I am there exists an unbearable situation, for example the hygienic conditions are very bad and I’m only allowed to take a shower twice a week. Furthermore, my position as a prisoner (accused of ‘associative crimes’) should allow me to have 4 hour’s visits and 2 telephone calls per month, but I’m still denied all this. I also have the right to be out of the cell 4 hours a day; on the contrary they only let me out for two hours and I’m also forbidden one hour of socialisation with the other prisoners. If a doctor, provided that I succeed in seeing one, prescribes me some therapy, I have to wait 36 hours before it becomes effective. We all are in isolation cells and we can’t talk with one another. Nothing is let in from the outside. And in spite of the fact that there is a censorship order, people who want to send us books have to post them by registered post. I should be allowed access to the library, but they deny me this on the basis of ridiculous reasons, such as lack of personnel.
The jailers all come from the 41bis section and they apply the same rules as the latter (for example, mirrors and razors have to be put out of the cell at night, and they would also take my camping gas away if I didn’t protest as I do). Moreover, I’m inflicted body and cell searches every day, as if I was in 41bis regime. It is clear that my prison condition and the one of the other comrades aims at total isolation, and goes far beyond what is officially decreed.
They have denied my partner permission to visit me on various occasions, even if visits are authorized. They want to exercise psychological and physical pressure on me, as they hope to annihilate the rebellious spirit that nourishes me. On the contrary, my will to struggle grows and grows. I won’t give in to their arrogance not will I react to it; it is what they want me to do so that they can show off their craving for punishment.
Sometimes pressure on prisoners is so hard that the latter commit suicide, but these State murders are often kept secret. Fuck the bourgeois press, which points out such problems only when it is a politician who dies in jail (like the major of Roccaraso) and when the prisoners’ protest is manipulated by the institutions. On the contrary, the thousands of crimes committed every day by the States in their prisons, in Italy as well as in the Spanish FIES units and in the Turkish prisons, are never made known because States have to appear ‘good’. If we want back the freedom they took away from us, we don’t have to wait for an amnesty, for general pardon or for political support or compromise; on the contrary, let’s be determined and stand up against jails and jailers so that not even a stone of their prisons is left standing.
I want to reassure all the comrades about my condition: my spirit is high and proud and my thoughts are more and more daring.
A big hug to all the comrades, those who are free and those who are kidnapped by the State.
An angry and daring prisoner from Poggioreale
October 13 2004 – A fridge van and another vehicle belonging to a butcher’s company are set to fire in Parma. The former is burnt, the latter not. The action is carried out to claim Sergio, Alessio and William’s freedom and in solidarity to the activists of Il Silvestre, who are under house arrest or in hiding.
October 20 2004 – Tombolino sends this communiqué from Poggioreale prison:
‘Dearest comrades, I’m writing to tell you that last week I experienced one of the most dreadful situations in my life. As you know, I spent a week in the so-called punishment cells after the director of the prison accused me of misconduct. Besides what he is doing to me, which is quite exaggerated, this gentleman is responsible for what happens every day in the concentration camp of Poggioreale. He wants to safeguard his reputation in front of the authorities and public opinion, who think that it is possible to control the anger of more than one thousand prisoners held in Poggioreale (whereas this prison can host only 1000 of them) through peaceful methods. This unscrupulous director tells his agents to terrorise the prisoners of this section, ‘Genova padiglione zero’, using any means necessary. Nothing happens by chance here, from the very arrival of a prisoner. Some of them cannot bear the situation, especially as they arrive in this section after being beaten (luckily this is not my case). Then violence becomes psychological for everybody and physical for some. There are special cells for those who have psychiatric problems, where the bed is attached to the floor and the toilet is a hole in the floor. The other cells have a table, a stool, the toilet and a basin. Psychological torture, which is inflicted on everybody, also derives from the fact that the cells are dirty, cold and damp; they don’t have any light switch or plugs. It is the pigs in uniform that decide about our use of electricity, furthermore they keep the emergency light (a yellow one) switched on during all the night. We can’t have a radio, read newspapers and the chance to get out of the cell. We can’t cook and even smoking depends on the jailers’ cruelty. This is allowed and guaranteed by ‘democratic power’: not only do they commit the crime of locking up individuals, but they also allow their servants to vent their anger on us, anger that comes to them from their awareness of being just handling puppets without heart nor dignity. They don’t care about prisoners, be they political prisoners, mafia offenders or junkies. The servants of the servants just torture prisoners without mercy and without knowing why. These cowards don’t have the courage to play their dirty games openly, so they always hide themselves behind armoured doors. But one can hear them and, as I’ve got ears I did hear them, fucking cowards. I witnessed the real manslaughter that guards inflict on defenceless men: buckets of cold water, verbal insults and even an invitation to hang themselves. It was painful to see all this, but luckily I was aware of the violence of the State. So I didn’t allow any psychological violence to affect me.
Comrades, I hope that all of us will reflect and react against the horrors that occur every day in the ‘padiglione Genova’ isolation section and in all prisons. I’ll keep on struggling with dignity even if I might be beaten for that. I will never ignore a man in trouble. Then what you do outside to support me and the other prisoners is great and fantastic. I could never denounce any infamy to their justice, but I can denounce it to our justice, which will remember everything. Solidarity to all prisoners who struggle with dignity against the violence guaranteed by power.
A big hug, always stand up’.
Marco
October 23 2004 – A demo in solidarity to Tombolino, Titto, Simone and Sergio is held in Viterbo. Here is the text of the poster inviting to join the event.
‘The show of democratic dominion, be it leftist or rightist, tries to obtain consensus on the one hand and to keep on its work of total destruction on the other, making it softer through a great deal of ‘glorious and humanitarian’ lies. Unions, political parties, judges and various kinds of cop: they all defend their vested interests and those of their servants, who are always ready to submit and become cannon fodder when the right time comes. Every time someone expresses dissent and decides to act, democracy, civilization and progress show their true face: the one of the torturers and murderers, the one of ferocious and cowardly repression. This face is kept well hidden and safe by the mafia-style media, with the result that the Home secretary can openly declare that he’s going to modify the law on subversive associations so that whoever rebels can be jailed more easily. The economic system, the media, technologies of control, and various religious and scientific sects are peripheral ramifications of power. Armies, judiciary, prison guards, industrialists and professionals of ‘health’ and social ‘illness’ destroy and ravage consciences, towns, natural resources, the life of entire peoples, communities and nameless individuals. There exists one and only one way against all this: the union between rebels and the exploited. There is no other way: sharing our memory and experience to act as autonomous beings, not as automatons. There exists no other way: revolt.
AGAINST ALL FORMS OF REPRESSION
AGAINST ISOLATION, CENSORSHIP, ARTICLE 41BIS, FIES REGIME AND ALL SPECIAL PRISON REGIMES
AGAINST ALL PRISONS
FREE OUR COMRADES AND ALL PRISONERS
WHOEVER ATTACKS DOMINION OPENLY IS OUR ACCOMPLICE’.
November 5 2004 – A letter that David had written to a few comrades on October 26 arrives at destination near Turin.
‘To the comrades in the anarchist and antiauthoritarian movement and to all good-hearted men and women.
My name is David Santini and I am an anarchist kidnapped by the State and locked up in the concentration camp ‘Le Vallette’, where censorship, isolation and searches are everyday events. I was accused of belonging to a subversive association that acts under different names but that has a common one called Anarchist Informal Federation. I claim my identity as an anarchist, but I deny the accusation. I’ve never belonged to any association, nor will I do that in the future, but I show my plain solidarity to those who ‘denounce’ the great injustices that occur in our society. I firmly oppose the accusation concerning the double level. The only double level that I know is the one of the judiciary investigating us. The first level, open and apparently legal, is employed by the judges when they sustain the necessity of our arrest; the second, hidden and practically illegal, and also, I add, dirty and infamous, is employed when police (especially Digos and ROS from Rome and Viterbo) falsify the evidence and tell lies about our struggle and our ideas. This is the democratic tyranny governing us and that finds in the prison an ideal place to give vent to its persecution methods. In the Vallette prison, as well as in any other, thousands of prisoners are in the hands of their jailers. It is here that, on October 10 I involuntarily experienced an episode that I’m going to tell you. As I had to receive a parcel, I was taken to the mail section by the guard who ‘takes care’ of censorship. As soon as I came into the room, I felt a strange nip on my abdomen. Then I realized that the guard who had to give me the parcel had put a knife on my belly. I reacted and told him not to repeat such a gesture again. He answered that he was surprised that the knife had not penetrated my stomach. When I came back to my cell I was very angry. Then, while having my hour outside the cell I met the guard who had taken me to the mail section. I started arguing with him about what had happened and he pretended he hadn’t realized it. The day after I was notified that a letter in which I had exposed the fact had been seized. I refused to sign the order of seizure and told them that it was a dirty trick they were using to prevent the fact from being known. The day after I was called by the director who tried to show me, with the penal code in his hand, that the seizure of my letter was perfectly legal. Then he told me that he had denounced the episode to the public prosecutor. I replied that I didn’t believe in their justice, that’s why I hadn’t denounced the fact by myself. This is just an example of what happens in this hellish place. I won’t go backwards; on the contrary, now more than before, I want a society free from bars and locks. Rebel greetings!’
Tittarello
November 8 2004 – Two explosive devices blow up one after the other outside San Vittore prison in Milan. The action is claimed by F.A.I./international Solidarity:
‘WE BRING ANOTHER WORLD HERE,
IN OUR HEARTS. THIS WORLD IS
GROWING IN THIS VERY MOMENT’.
B. DURRUTI
MILAN – IN THE NIGHT BETWEEN SUNDAY AND MONDAY WE HAVE TRIED TO ATTACK THE COPS IN SAN VITTORE CONCENTRATION CAMP WITH TWO EXPLOSIONS AND IN SOLIDARITY TO:
-THE ANARCHISTS WHO ARE DETAINED IN ITALY, SWITZERLAND, SPAIN AND GERMANY
-THOSE WHO ARE STRUGGLING IN THE FIES REGIME IN SPAIN
-THOSE WHO ARE INFLICTED TORTURE AND VIOLENCE IN JAIL EVERY DAY.
THROUGH THIS ATTACK WE TAKE PART IN THE STRUGGLE CAMPAIGN AGAINST PRISONS AND JAILERS THAT WAS LAUNCHED BY THE ARMED CELLS FOR INTERNATIONAL SOLIDARITY. WE ALSO WANT TO ANSWER THE APPEAL OF THE ANARCHIST COMRADES IN ITALY AND GERMANY. WE WON’T TALK NOW ABOUT THE NECESSITY OF DESTROYING ALL PRISONS, THE PILLARS OF THE REPRESSIVE SYSTEM NEEDED TO SAFEGUARD THIS SOCIETY BASED ON AUTHORITY AND EXPLOITATION. PRISONS, COPS, JUDGES AND SOLDIERS ARE THE FORTIFIED RAMPART BEHIND WHICH THE POWERFUL ARE BARRICADED. ANY CRACK THAT THE EXPLOITED BRING TO THESE WALLS IS A STEP TOWARDS THEIR DESTRUCTION. OUR REFUSAL FOR THAT MIX OF CONCRETE AND PAIN THAT IS PRISON DOES NOT ACCEPT COMPROMISE. OUR EXPLOSIVE DOES NOT KNOW DISTINCTION BETWEEN GOOD GUARDS AND BAD GUARDS, BETWEEN THOSE WHO ARE AWARE OF THE INFAMY REPRESENTED BY THEIR UNIFORM AND THOSE WHO ARE NOT. AS REPRESSION STRIKES ANARCHIST COMRADES AT RANDOM, SO WE WILL STRIKE THE COPS, WITH THEIR HANDCUFFS AND BUNCHES OF KEYS. WE WANT TO MAKE CLEAR A FEW POINTS CONCERNING THE OPERATION CERVANTES AND THE CONFUSED WAY IN WHICH WE WERE CALLED INTO QUESTION. THE JUDGES DRAW A LONG LIST OF ATTACKS THAT HAVE BEEN CARRIED OUT FOR THE LAST YEARS AGAINST DOMINION. SOME OF THEM ARE ANONYMOUS BUT THEY HAVE ALL BEEN ATTRIBUTED TO THE F.A.I., WHICH MAKE THE WORK OF REPRESSION MUCH EASIER. WE INVITE THESE MISERABLE JUDGES WHO HAVE LOCKS INSTEAD OF BRAINS TO REVISE THEIR GRAMMAR FIRST OF ALL, THEN TO READ AGAIN OUR DOCUMENT CALLED "OPEN LETTER TO THE ANARCHIST AND ANTIAUTHORITARIAN MOVEMENT", IN WHICH WE EXPOSE WHY THE F.A.I. WAS CREATED. WE WANT TO REMIND ALL COMRADES AND REBELS THAT THE ACTIONS OF F.A.I ARE JUST THOSE WHICH ARE CARRIED OUT BY INDIVIDUALS WHO SHARE THE SAME PROJECT OF THE F.A.I. AND THEREFORE DECIDE TO CLAIM THESE ACTIONS AS F.A.I. THE STRUCTURE THAT WE HAVE CREATED TOGETHER WITH OTHER COMRADES HAS NO INTENT OF HEGEMONY AS OUR ANARCHIST ETHIC DOES NOT ACCEPT ANY LEADERSHIP OR AUTHORITY. THE ORGANISATION IS AN INSTRUMENT THAT SERVES TO MULTIPLY METHODS AND QUALITY OF THE ATTACKS. WE ARE NOT INTERESTED IN FORMING A POWERFUL GROUP THAT IS REGARDED WITH ADMIRATION OR FEAR IN THE DISTANCE. ON THE CONTRARY, WE ARE TRYING TO INTERTWINE THE THREADS OF REVOLT SO THAT THERE WILL ALWAYS BE A CHANCE FOR SOCIAL REVOLUTION.
FREE ALL IMPRISONED REBELS !!!
FIRE TO PRISONS AND JAILERS !!!
REVOLT IS CONTAGIOUS AND CAN BE REPRODUCED!!!
PS: IN ORDER TO AVOID INCONVENIENCE WE INVITE MEDICAL AND FIRST AID STAFF, FIREMEN, BYSTANDERS AND TOO APPREHENSIVE OWNERS OF CARS TO KEEP AWAY FROM PLACES WHERE EXPLOSIONS OCCUR AND CARS AND BIKES BLOW UP, ESPECIALLY IF THE LATTER ARE CLOSE TO PLACES OF DOMINION. LET ONLY POLICEMEN APPROACH THE AREA, IF THEY ARE REALLY CURIOUS ABOUT WHAT’S HAPPENING.
F.A.I./INTERNATIONAL SOLIDARITY
1st BASKET: PICNIC BASKET CONTAINING EXPLOSIVE POWDER
2nd BASKET: COFFEE MACHINE FULL OF DYNAMITE.’
- In the same night another explosive device blows up against an ‘Adecco’ agency in Milan. The action is claimed by the ‘Metropolitan Cells/Anarchist Informal Federation’. A few newspapers publish the text of the claim:
‘WE CLAIM THAT WE CARRIED OUT DIRECT ACTIONS AGAINST WORK AGENCIES IN MILAN: "MAN POWER" IN VIA IMBONATI (ATTACKED ON OCTOBER 29 2004) AND "ADECCO" IN CORSO LODI (ATTACKED ON NOVEMBER 11 2004).
THE SOCIETY WHICH WE LIVE IN IS A CAGE AND IT FEEDS ITSELF BY EXPLOITING MILLIONS OF PEOPLE.
WORK IS THE CRITERION FOR COLLOCATING MEN AND WOMEN IN SPECIFIC COMPARTMENTS OF THE SOCIAL HIERARCHY.
IT IS WORK THAT ESTABLISHES OUR PLACE IN THE PYRAMID, THAT DECIDES WHO OUR BOSSES ARE AND WHO OUR SUBORDINATES ARE. WORK AGENCIES ARE AN EFFECTIVE INSTRUMENT OF THE POWERFUL FOR INCREASING THEIR POWER AND THEIR PROFIT. AS A RESULT, FURTHER EXPLOITATION IS INFLICTED AND FREEDOM IS DENIED.
ANARCHIST INFORMAL FEDERATION/METROPOLITAN CELLS’.
November 12 2004 – Sergio, Simone, Tittarello and Tombolino are searched in their cells by the Digos on order of public prosecutor Vitello. The reasons for the searches are clearly exposed by Sergio through this communiqué:
‘Friday November 12 I was searched by Digos officers on the orders of public prosecutor Vitello. My three co-defendants were searched too. The official reason for the search is that they had to find "documents" connecting us to the FAI. They also looked for evidence linking us to the recent direct actions in Milan and to the threatening letters sent to the prison authority that keeps us prisoners.
When reading their motivations, I noticed that their witch-hunt presents a few constant points.
First of all they can’t understand that anarchists don’t need anyone to tell them who is guilty of the misery in which we live. Certainly these people are so accustomed to obeyING orders that they can’t understand what individual action is. No less can they understand that whoever lives as a free being and is reconciled with his/her wild part will no doubt follow his/her instinct and his/her desires against the enemy.
Secondly, they are always surprised that people we don’t know personally call us "comrades" and want our freedom. My comrades are those whose heart tell them to struggle, those who love life and hate whoever tries to tame it with laws, morals and false needs. There exists no anarchist organisation; on the contrary there exists a common desire to take our life back. Those who think that struggling for their own desires is a necessity are my comrades, brothers or sisters, even if I don’t know them personally.
Finally, prosecutors can’t accept the idea that there exists active solidarity; in fact they persist in giving great importance to small actions. They probably think that the practise of direct action can spread. Well, this means that certain tactics can really disturb them…think about it.
I must point out that there wasn’t any interesting object in my cell, so they got nowhere with their search.
However, I’d like to thank Digos inspectors Fulvia Corfese, Carlo Giuliano, Francesco Iacopino and Bruno Doldo for having interrupted our boring prison routine. I’d also like to thank prison police inspector Antonio Spano and my beloved landlord Oreste Bologna, director of Palmi prison, for their participation.
I say hi to you with a smile on my lips, as life is still strong in me. I hope the noise of your laughter will soon reach me as well as the chaos of your desires.
A big hug to all comrades’.
A free comrade
November 24 2004 – Sergio writes this communiqué from Palmi prison:
‘I’ve been in prison for a few months and there is a concrete possibility that I might have to stay here for another long while. I have to say that this experience is turning out to be less devastating than I expected. This is not a lack of respect towards those who are suffering in jail; nor do I want to minimise the violence that welcomes you when you enter this place, with body searches representing an offence to our dignity as men and women; not to mention all the other provocations and real torture that the guards inflict on you and that aim at destroying your inner being, your freedom and intimacy. It is possible that those who see the bars and chains from outside do not suffer less, but certainly they are not traumatised by being face to face with the most brutal form of dominion: prison. Those who end up in jail following the revenge that the State is taking on them because of their struggle and desire of freedom at least have the certainty that they have escaped the prison of obedience and resignation. It is hard to be denied the closeness of one’s own comrades; it is unbearable to be handcuffed, it is hideous to be forced into inactivity. The dreams of most prisoners are disturbed by the noise of closing gates, but I have to say that I’m lucky compared with those who think of human relations only in terms of exploiter and exploited, or those who have their days built in seconds, minutes, hours and whose watch ticks like chains. I’m lucky compared with those whose horizons are limited and hidden by the concrete of buildings, factories and fences; I’m lucky compared with those who are so dazed by the cacophony of cars, domestic appliances, mobiles, TV and radio (in other words the well-being of technology) that they can no longer hear the voice of Mother Earth, which on the contrary invites all of us to take back our existence and joy of life and action. A few comrades asked me to write about my experience as a prisoner, and I’m really enthusiastic that they did. But in fact prison doesn’t give me any particular inspiration and what must be said is always the same. Maybe my ideas got stronger and I’m more convinced than before that the system must be destroyed with any means necessary, the system that not only produces prisons but also legitimates them. If I have learned a lesson from this experience, it is that it is better to risk one’s life and freedom rather than to live in grey and suffocating towns and have one’s consciousness asleep. It is easy to lose one’s freedom in this industrial-capitalist technocracy that does not accept any opposition apart from reformism based on compromise. I will never complain about not having reached the aim of my struggle. Just having decided for the destruction of whatever transforms animals and our Mother Earth into goods and resources to be exploited: this is my liberation. Maybe my way as a green anarchist and the fact that I love life deeply in all its forms took me to prison, but it does not matter how big this obstacle will be, I will never forget all the people I met and all the joy I experienced on my path. I have the sensation that I’m freer than the miserable beings that hold the keys of my cell. I strongly hope that the comrades who are furious about my situation will turn their rage into a weapon against the system that keeps me imprisoned and that the struggles I have always supported will go on.
November 2004
A free comrade
December 6 2004 – A trial against the squatting of houses in Viterbo that happened in 2001 is held in Viterbo court. As Simone and Tombolino are among the defendants, a solidarity demo is organised outside the court. The trial is postponed and will take place in January 2005.
December 10 2004 – An envelope containing a videotape connected to an explosive device is sent to the head office of the ‘S.A.P.P.C.’, the union of police prison, in Rome. The explosive is recognized and defused.
December 11 2004 – Another mail explosive device is sent to the National Association of Carabinieri. It will also be recognized and defused.
The claim by the Armed Cells for International Solidarity arrives a few days later:
"THERE EXISTS NO PACIFIC AND LEGAL WAY TO
SORT THE SITUATION OUT. ONLY VIOLENCE CAN
FACE THE VIOLENCE THEY INFLICT ON US.
ONLY VIOLENT REVOLUTION.
ERRICO MALATESTA
"WE ATTACKED SOME OF THOSE DIRECTLY RESPONSIBLE FOR THE VIOLENCE AND TERROR OF THE STATE, THAT IS TO SAY THE EXECUTIONERS THAT EVERY DAY IN JAILS AND POLICE HEADQUARTERS INFLICT TORTURE AND ABUSE ON REBELS WHO DO NOT ACCEPT STATE DOMINION AND REPRESSION FROM ITS SERVANTS IN UNIFORM.
WE HOPE THIS ACTION WILL BE EFFECTIVE AND SET AN EXAMPLE SO AS TO REVENGE ALL INFLICTED VIOLENCE AND TO TERRORISE THOSE WHO LEGITIMATE THEIR POWER WITH VIOLENCE.
THROUGH THIS ACTION WE RE-LAUNCH THE REVOLUTIONARY CAMPAIGN AGAINST PRISON THAT STARTED IN APRIL WITH THE ATTACK ON DAP, AND THAT WAS THEN STRENGTHENED BY THE ACTIONS CARRIED OUT BY THE COMRADES OF INTERNATIONAL SOLIDARITY.
SOLIDARITY TO THE PRISONERS IN STRUGGLE AGAINST THE PRISON SYSTEM, ITS TORTURES, ITS BRUTALITY AND ITS ISOLATION.
SOLIDARITY TO ALL THE ANARCHISTS HIT BY THE REPRESSION IN ITALY, SPAIN, GERMANY AND ALL OVER THE WORLD.
WE WANT TO SAY TO THOSE RESPONSIBLE FOR REPRESSION, NAMELY JUDGES, COPS AND THEIR COLLABORATORS: AS YOU SHOOT INTO THE CROWD OUR RAGE GROWS, AND WE ARE READY TO MAKE IT EXPLODE IN YOUR HANDS WHEREVER YOU ARE.
YOU WON’T STOP US.
LONG LIVE THE F.A.I.
LONG LIVE ANARCHY
ANARCHIST INFORMAL FEDERATION/ARMED CELLS FOR INTERNATIONAL SOLIDARITY".
December 12 2004 – Two squats in Rome, ‘Marmitta’ and ‘Bencivenga’ are searched by carabinieri. The search warrant was signed the day before by public prosecutor Vitello following the investigation for the ‘Cervantes’ operation.
In particular, the search was aimed at finding material used to manufacture the mail explosive devices that were sent to the sites of the prison police union (Sappe) and of the Carabinieri National Association on December 10 and December 11 respectively.
December 18 2004 – A demo in solidarity to Tombolino and to all prisoners is held outside ‘Poggioreale’ prison in Naples. Here is the communiqué launching the action:
INSTEAD OF PRISON: NOTHING!
The aim of prison has always been to guarantee respect for the rules and laws that power creates. Prison is the punishment inflicted on rebels and poor people who cannot obey the law and are therefore locked up and tortured, both physically and psychologically. As more and more people get poor and social unrest is spreading, power strengthens brutal repression and social control. In fact, it fears that revolts break out as well as the consciousness that subverting this inhuman system, which produces only death and desperation, is now an absolute necessity. Repressive laws that kill any form of freedom, hundreds of cameras controlling every moment of our life and a massive militarization of our territory are a few instruments that power employs to eliminate dissent. Those who do not resign themselves to the imposed rules have to face one and only one reality: jail! Politicians want us to think that prison has the task of rehabilitating prisoners and getting them back into society. The truth is actually very different. Prison is punishment for the prisoner just like hell is punishment for catholics. Overcrowded jails, dozens of ‘unclear’ deaths, beatings, isolation and harshtreatment regimes (such as 41bis) try to destroy human dignity every day in the attempt to gain obedience from those who do not fit into the scheme power imposes, or to physically annihilate them. ‘Poggioreale’ is one of the most striking examples of hellish prison. It is a very old and dilapidated building, where overcrowding is well beyond an acceptable limit; hygienic and health conditions are just ridiculous, a weapon used by the guard dogs to humiliate and torture those who are under their fire. It is precisely in this prison that our comrade Tombolino is being held following a Digos and ROS operation, which also led to the arrest of Simone, Tittarello and Sergio and to the investigation of many others. Our comrades were arrested on July 27 on the grounds of mere hypothesis and suspicion. The court, which admitted the total lack of evidence, keeps on refusing their release. We are not here to discuss whether our comrades are guilty or innocent as our solidarity to them is beyond dispute. We are here to make it clear once again that the only solution to the ‘problem of prisons’ is their total destruction. If we want our freedom back, we do not have to wait for any amnesty or political support nor do we have to come to a compromise. We just have to be determined and revolt against prison and jailers so that not a single stone of their jails is left standing.
DEMO AGAINST PRISON ON SATURDAY DECEMBER 18, PIAZZALE CENNI (close to the new built court).
December 20 2004 – ‘David Santini (Titto), who was arrested on July 27 and has endured isolation for five months in ‘Le Vallette’ prison in Turin, was moved today to a high surveillance section, where prisoners arrested for Mafia crimes or drug trafficking are held.
As always occurs when certain types of prisoners are involved, David was ‘presented’ to the others before his arrival and he now has a reputation he certainly didn’t want.
As David’s section has changed, procedure concerning his mail has also changed. As a result, more strict control will be applied and his mail is likely to undergo further delay. Furthermore, David being the only prisoner of his category, all other prisoners’ letters will be checked in the fear that mail is send to David through other prisoners. This will probably affect relationships inside the prison, but we hope that the other prisoners will understand the real reason why further restriction has been inflicted on them.
Our unrestrained solidarity goes to David, Alessio and to all the arrested comrades.
Anarchists from the Alps
December 29 2004 – Another letter from Titto gets out of the prison:
‘A hearing concerning the squatting of a place that took place in Viterbo in 2001 will be held on January 21 at the Viterbo court. I am among the 25 defendants. As I’m quite far from Viterbo, I was uncertain whether to go to the hearing or not. In the end I resolved to go, which will give me the chance to meet a lot of dear comrades I haven’t seen for months. I’d like to express a few considerations about the trial we are going to face. First of all it must be said that a simple and, in my opinion, legitimate squatting of houses is going to be exploited by investigators and servant journalists in order to add new false evidence to the inexistent criminal plan that the comrades from Viterbo are supposed to be carrying out. I want to answer this delirium and point out that the real criminal plan is the Digos’, as the latter is now using its repressive logic against people who had taken a few houses away from the most hideous decay and made them inhabitable and decent. These houses had been occupied after years of abandon by a few people who think that having a house is a right, and it must be taken back if denied. The real criminals are those who throw out people who want something more than simply obeying and surviving, even if it is well known that dozens of families in Viterbo can’t afford to pay rent for a house.
No one said a word about how rent prices are growing and how difficult it is to get a house. In spite of the fact that Viterbo is a brainwashed town, there are still some who can see that what surrounds us is not what they want us to believe. In the Bagnaia squat we did just that: we took back what had been stolen from us. Judges, you are going to decide if we are innocent or guilty, you are going to ask yourself questions. I don’t care about your sentence. What I care, on the contrary, is the solidarity I found in the other squatters (apart from those who were friends of the cops). I realized that even the other squatters hated the privileged exploiters who promise things just to safeguard their position.
I talked with one of the inhabitants of the squatted houses, and he warned me about the sudden repressive response that would follow. His belief was unfortunately due to a previous experience, as he and his family had squatted another house in Viterbo and they had been violently evicted by the police. If we are called "terrorists" how can you call those who beat, threaten and insult men, women and children who can’t pay rent, and then kick them out of their home?
Honestly I can’t find a more appropriate word than "terrorists" to define these "officers". What they do is terror; what they are ordered to do is terror.
As usual, history repeats itself.
Repressive organs are servants of power and use terror in order to satisfy the latter, whereas the exploited follow their will to take their life back.
I therefore express my solidarity to those who took part in that squat, which was an experience of struggle; to those who think that we do not have to content ourselves with the shit that the bosses lavish on us; to those who think that squatting places is legitimate and recalls a model of life free from institutions and political parties.
Squats are places that we take away from dominion and from where we can expand our desire for freedom.
ONE OF THE DEFENDANTS.
December 31 2004 – A communiqué from Tombolino gets out of prison:
‘Dear comrades, first of all I want to reassure you about my conditions, then I want to tell you that the solidarity demos outside "Regina Coeli" prison, inside Viterbo court on December 6 and outside "Poggioreale" prison in Naples have given me great strength that has helped me to face my life as a prisoner.
I’m writing to let you know about the nth intimidatory act I was submitted by the jailers I have to cope with.
On December 21 I was called to be visited by a doctor. As I was in the infirmary, I realized that two shit guards were there too. So I kindly asked them if they could go out because I had to take my clothes off and be visited by the doctor. As always, they regarded my request, which was my right, as if it was a challenge to their power. The guards, in fact, answered that I had not understood anything about "Poggioreale". Then I addressed to the doctor and told him I wouldn’t undertake the visit because my right to privacy was denied. The doctor, who obviously belonged to the same dirty face of power, said he didn’t know the regulation concerning 41bis or E.I.V. prisoners. So I said to both the doctor and the guards that they should be ashamed of themselves, and I went away. I was later called by the inspector of the section, who wanted to provoke me. In fact he wanted to know what I had said to the doctor. I explained to him calmly that his role was not to question my talks with the doctor, nor was it to ask me, as he had done previously, the meaning of some words, appropriate in my opinion, which I used in my letters to mention the jailers.
On December 27 I was accused by the disciplinary committee of having insulted the doctors and the guards. Unfortunately I attended the disciplinary board session and I also tried to justify myself. It was useless: the right to a defence is denied to you who are outside, imagine to prisoners! Anyway I am now in "the cells" and I will be staying here for two weeks. What makes me angry is not so much the fact that conditions are harsher here than they were in the "Venezia" section. Here the cells are cold, damp, dirty, there’s no TV, an emergency light is always on, and I’ve got no chance of cooking and going to the courtyard. The other prisoners in this section are compelled to wear a special pyjama provided by the prison, they are also beaten and then injected medicines. You will have understood that I was put in the psychiatric and contagious disease section, even if I should be in the punishment section. What makes me angry is that the jailers found a way to satisfy their will to power over me. They are wanna-be "bosses", even if they chose to submit to their own bosses for all their life.
A lot of humiliation has been inflicted on me over these months, but they will never inflict the most hideous one: resignation to their cowardly methods. Last month has been particularly hard, and I start thinking that all their reprisals against me depend on the strong solidarity that was expressed to me by all of you outside. It might also depend on the fact that prisoners in the "Venezia" section are in protest against the prison conditions and are refusing the food provided by the administration. Consider that nothing like that had ever been seen in this section, even if I think that the protest should be stronger.
I hope they won’t give me another occasion to tell you about some other infamy inflicted on me. I also hope that in this society of bosses and servants the instinct that is in every one of us will prevail: the one of REBELLION!
I’d like to greet you one by one, but as this is not possible I send a big hug to all of you. A proud new year!!!!!!!!!!!!!
TOMBOLINO
January 18 2005 – Valeria, Tombolino’s partner, writes about the latter: ‘On January 8 he was called by the prison director, following another order of the disciplinary board. This time he refused to take part to their miserable and sordid show. This is the fourth time in five months. This is the way they are trying to torture him psychologically. In fact on January 3 Tombolino had just finished his punishment period in the ZERO section, that is to say the psychiatric and contagious diseases section!! Marco should not have been confined in this section as the reason for this punishment was, as they said, a breach of discipline. The real reason is that he does not resign himself to these infamous people. On January 9 he was taken by 15 guards to another section and was not allowed to bring his belongings. Once he was in the basement, he was searched and ordered to do knee-bends, which he refused. As he was wearing only his underpants, he was given a pyjama like the ones they give to those they call mad people, a very big pyjama without bottoms or strings. He was not even allowed to keep his shoe laces. They said it was for security reasons, which I can’t really understand; in fact they also gave him very strong sheets, knives, glass and razor blades. Very secure objects to be given to mad people, indeed! In the last month their rage against Tombolino has grown, but I want tell you that THEY WILL NEVER CONQUER HIM!!! Whoever knows him also knows that he will never give up. All in all he is doing well and is determined to resist and struggle against those who want him to resign himself to their infamous and cowardly methods. I want also tell you that for once Marco witnessed a very nice event: one of those people that they call mad, and that I consider genius, threw some shit on the inspector of the section using a toilet brush.
Tombolino RESISTS with great dignity and is waiting for of all you at the hearing on January 21 in Viterbo.
WARM AND REBEL GREETINGS’
January 21 2005 – A few comrades organize a solidarity gathering outside Viterbo court, where Tittarello, Sergio and Tombolino are facing trial for the squatting in Viterbo in 2001.
January 25 2005 – At 4am an Y10 car blows up in the park outside ‘Buoncammino’ prison in Cagliari (Sardinia). It seems that the explosion is very strong and that it throws metal sparks 100 metres away, reaching the area of the prison.
-A few minutes later, a bomb explodes just outside the door of the house of a carabinieri officer in Quartu Sant’Elena (Cagliari, Sardinia). It causes damages to the official’s house and car. The day after the latter was supposed to attend a hearing in Genoa following the G8 summit in 2001.
January 27 2005 – A gathering in solidarity to Sergio and Agnese, accused of having placed an explosive device outside a butcher’s shop in Arezzo, is organized outside the court where the two comrades are facing trial. The hearing is postponed to March 7. A leaflet, ‘Time of repression – Time of solidarity’ is distributed on this occasion.
Sergio also writes the following communiqué:
‘Today Agnese and I are going to be sacrificed on the altar of social peace in one of the many "temples of justice". What am I talking about? I’m talking about how investigators were so quick in finding the responsible for the facts that occurred in Arezzo, and how they accused two anarchists; I’m talking about how all the abuses inflicted in 8 months of detention are justified by little suspicion and no evidence at all; I’m talking about how the accusation (manufacture and transport of war weapons), which is quite serious and derives from a special law of the Seventies, and the related sentence (3 to 12 years imprisonment for manufacturing weapons and 2 to 10 years imprisonment for carrying them) prove that the system cannot accept any dissent that is not expressed in words alone. And if it strikes so hard it is not because of the gravity of the facts but because of the reasons that are beyond them. I don’t intend to confess that we are not those responsible for the actions against shoppers who profit from death. I don’t plead guilty nor do I plead not guilty because I support the actions that I’m accused of and because I don’t recognize any authority in the judicial machinery. On the contrary, as an anarchist, I despise the latter and I want to destroy it. My lawyer is the one who has to cope with these surly people in gowns, he’s paid to make clear that they need evidence; otherwise they can’t prosecute me and at the same time keep up their image of guarantors of justice. I can just watch the farce and clap my hands when it is finished. It doesn’t matter if I’m cleared or condemned, what matters is that I still believe that criminals are those who make a profit from life, not those who make it free. Criminals are those who go around armed with a gun and with the arrogance of a uniform. Criminals are those who go around armed with a penal code they didn’t ask you to aprove, not those who are armed with their desires and struggle for what they believe in. My contempt is for jailers, exploiters, cops, judges and, most importantly, for the resigned accomplices of what they don’t want to destroy. My love and respect is for those who struggle, those who defend our Mother Earth and for all the comrades who are always so close to me.
If I end up in jail it will not be because of bombs, as my inquisitors know all too well, but because of my ideas and words, which frighten them to such a point that they consider them weapons. You are right in being frightened because our war will not stop until we smash down the bastions of dominion and exploitation.
An enemy of those who lock cages
A friend of those who open them
A free comrade’
February 2 2005 – A gathering in solidarity to Tombolino is organised outside ‘Poggioreale’ prison in Naples.
-A mail explosive device is sent to ‘Mammagialla’ prison in Viterbo. The press say that the device was made by 250 grams of explosive powder collocated in a DVD box. The mail was addressed to Francesco Rutelli, vice-director of the prison.
March 3 2005 – An explosive device collocated in a skip blows up behind the carabinieri headquarters in Pra’ area in Genoa. A few minutes later another device explodes in the neighbourhood. Twenty minutes later, a third device placed in a skip blows up outside the carabinieri headquarters in Voltri area in Genoa. About an hour later, an explosive device detonates in the surroundings of a carabinieri headquarters in Milan, followed by another one in the same area, which detonates when police are on the spot.
Here is the text claiming the actions:
‘GENOA, 7.45PM: INCENDIARY DEVICE EXPLODES IN THE SURROUNDINGS OF THE CARABINIERI HEADQUARTERS IN PRA (GENOA)
GENOA, 8.30PM: EXPLOSIVE DEVICE (PRESSURE COOKER FULL OF CHLORATE) BLOWS UP IN THE SURROUNDINGS OF THE CARABINIERI HEAD-QUARTERS IN VOLTRI (GENOA)
MILAN, 9.30PM: EXPLOSIVE DEVICE (METAL PIPE PLUS DYNAMITE) DETONATES IN THE SURROUNDINGS OF ONE OF THE CARABINIERI HEADQUARTERS THAT INFEST VIA MONTI AREA
SANREMO, 11.38PM: EXPLOSIVE DEVICE (ELECTRIC BOX PLUS DYNAMITE) BLOWS UP INSIDE ARISTON THEATRE DURING THE LIVE BROADCAST OF THE ITALIAN SONG FESTIVAL.
OPERATION ‘VIVA VILLA’ – A WARNING TO
THE SYSTEM OF DOMINION
AND PRIVILEGE
IT IS POINTLESS TO BARRICADE YOURSELVES BEHIND HUNDREDS OF CAMERAS THAT WATCH YOUR MISERY AND INEPTITUDE… TODAY WE CHOSE THE STAGE TO REMIND YOU OF THE REALITY OF FACTS AGAINST YOUR CALM, FALSE AND DEMOCRATIC CERTAINTY. WE DON’T LIKE THE LIMELIGHT, WE JUST EXPLOIT IT WHEN NECESSARY, ESPECIALLY IF SOME FRIGHTENED ARSE GETS UP FROM HIS VELVET SEAT, TERRORISED AT THE IDEA THAT PRIVILEGE IS NOT ETERNAL NOR IS IT PAINLESS… WE REMIND YOU OF THE REALITY OF THINGS:
-PRISON IS EXPANDING AND STRENGTHENING ITS METHODS OF ANNIHILATION.
-SUICIDE AND PSYCHOLOGICAL AND PHYSICAL ABUSE ARE THE RULE INSIDE ITALIAN PRISONS (BEATINGS, NO CHANCE OF MEDICAL TREATMENT WHEN NECESSARY, COMPULSORY MEDICAL TREATMENT WHEN NOT REQUESTED, TILL THE LAST REFINED TRICK: THE FORBIDDEN BOOK AS HAPPENED IN BIELLA PRISON).
-WE KNOW THAT THE STATE KILLS AND THAT COPS, CARABINIERI, ETC ARE THE ARMED MEN OF DOMINION AND DEFEND IT DAILY (THAT IS WHY WE WOKE THEM UP THE FIRST).
-WE KNOW THAT TORTURE DOES NOT EXIST ONLY IN EXOTIC PRISONS SUCH AS GUANTANAMO OR ABU GRAHIB, ON THE CONTRARY IT IS ALSO HERE.
WE EXPLOITED THE FRIVOLOUS SCENARY OF ‘THE MOST LOVED ITALIAN SHOW’ TO GET ACROSS A MESSAGE OF FREEDOM AND SOLIDARITY TO ALL PRISONERS, AND TO MAKE YOU AWARE OF WHAT THE PROPAGANDA OF THE REGIME TRIES TO HIDE. WE WILL ALWAYS FIND A WAY OF BREAKING INTO YOUR EXPENSIVE THEATRES, UNTIL THE DAY WE SET A TABLE UPON YOUR GRAVES. JAILERS IN ALL ITALIAN PRISONS MUST KNOW THAT WE WON’T DELAY IN FOLLOWING THE EXAMPLE OF THE SARDINIAN REVLUTIONARY RESISTENCE MOVEMENT, WHICH ON JANUARY 25 STRUCK THE HOUSE OF A CARABINIERE, A TORTURER IN BOLZANETO, IN QUARTU SANT’ELENA, AND AT THE BUONCAMMINO PRISON IN CAGIARI.
JOY AND FREEDOM FOR SIMONE, MARCO, DAVID, SERGIO, FEDERICO, ALFREDO, CLAUDIO, MARCO, AMANDA…
JOY AND FREEDOM FOR GABRIEL POMBO DA SILVA, JOSE FERNANDEZ DELGADO, BART DE GEETER!
JOY AND FREEDOM FOR THOSE WHO STRUGGLE EVERY DAY IN THE PRISONS ALL OVER THE WORLD AGAINST OPPRESSORS!
JOY AND FREEDOM FOR EVERYBODY!
ACTION COMES FOR US AND FOR THEM WITHOUT DEADLINES, IT APPEARS AND DISAPPEARS FOLLOWING ITS BREATH, IT MAKES A FOOL OF RULES AND BRINGS ABOUT THE CONSCIOUS ANSWER OF THE OPPRESSED.
PS: AS YOU STRIKE AT RANDOM AND THROW THE FISHING NET IN THE SEA OF THE ANARCHIST MOVEMENT IN ORDER TO CAPTURE SOMEONE TO BE SACRIFICED ON THE ALTAR OF JUDICIAL REVENGE, SO WE WILL STRIKE AT RANDOM AND HIT AT YOUR FILTHY MASS OF TERROR LABOURERS. COPS AND JUDGES, YOU ARE PLAYING A DIRTY GAME AND ARE GOING ALONG THE SAME PATH AGAIN, BUT ALL YOU WILL GET IS SHOWING OFF YOUR MISERABLE EXISTENCE AS BUREAUCRATS OF TORTURE. IN THE PAST WE MADE IT CLEAR THAT OUR FREE SOLIDARITY BONDED TOGETHER VARIOUS GROUPS THAT SUPPORT ONE ANOTHER. THROUGH THIS CAMPAIGN WE EXPRESS STRONGER SOLIDARITY TO THOSE WHO STRUGGLE INSIDE THE JAILS OF DOMINION: TO THE IMPRISONED ANARCHISTS AND TO THE PRISONERS OF THE SOCIAL WAR BETWEEN EXPLOITERS AND THE EXPLOITED. BEAR IN MIND THAT IF YOU MAKE CANNON FODDER OUT OF ANARCHISTS, WE WILL MAKE THE SAME OUT OF YOU, WHICH WILL BE PURE JOY. WE CAN MAKE A LOT OF PROMISES BUT WE ARE NOT IN ANY PARTICULAR HURRY TO FULFIL THEM. TIME WILL WITNESS OUR PRECISION IN COMMITTING OURSELVES TO THAT. THE SPARKS OF ACTION WILL TURN INTO A RAIN OF KNIVES STUCK IN THE HEART AND LIMBS OF DOMINION. THIS CAMPAIGN IS DEDICATED TO MARCELLO LONZI, A BOY MURDERED DURING A WILD BEATING IN LIVORNO PRISON.
F.A.I./FIRE AND SIMILAR CRAFTWORK COOPERATIVE
(OCCASIONALLY SPECTACULAR)
F.A.I./JULY 20 BRIGADE’.
The following communiqué is sent along with the claim of the actions:
CONTRIBUTION TO THE DEBATE
INSIDE THE ANARCHIST AND ANTIAUTHORITARIAN MOVEMENT
1) About revolutionary elites, specialists, relations with social reality and simple projects…and the concreteness of utopia!
The anarchist movement is and must be a revolutionary movement. It is not a movement of opinion that makes propaganda about civil liberties to be conquered through folk dances, colourful and bloodless parades; nor is it the exclusive club of a little group of pedantic theorists of insurrection who cope with society according to which way the wind is blowing.
Our actions and the answers to those who criticise us come from these assumptions.
One of the most common critiques that are addressed to us is that we run the risk of turning ourselves into specialists of ‘militant practise’, doing actions for the action’s sake and that we lack a project. On the contrary, what we are doing is to work in order to widen social awareness on a revolutionary level. What we are doing is action through deeds, but our detractors insist on affirming that results must be obtained gradually and they therefore undertake partial struggles that do not have any revolutionary issue. We employ certain means because we have an objective vision of reality. We therefore combine our revolutionary tension towards the subversion of the existent with the times and places we live in. Western society in the 21st century is not at all a pre-revolutionary terrain, even if it is not totally at peace. In this context we use action through deeds as the most effective means that give immediate and long lasting results, means that can be easily imitated and that help to make our ideas understood. Social conflict cannot be triggered by boring analysis to be spread through leaflets and pamphlets as if it was the new secular Word of the exploited. The latter are either aware of being exploited or fight to arrive at work in time, and in this case they don’t deserve to be considered as workers in struggle against exploitation. Some proposed analyses claim that any meaningless event is a moment of class struggle and that it represents a good step that the exploited take towards revolution. In this way many comrades invest their energy in fruitless struggles that come to nothing and that have meaningless slogans. Sometimes, and this is even worse, aberrant and authoritarian attitudes come out from the obsessive attempt to relate to ‘people’: it is typical of those who are full of themselves and think they are above the social context, who engage in partial struggles and are convinced they have the truth in their pocket. Anarchists are a minority in the social tissue, so they cannot pretend to be prophets or priests; nor can they use soft and confused slogans for fear of disturbing the audience. This is the reason why, nowadays, an explosive device sent to a carabiniere or to a journalist servant of power, or a bomb that causes even a little crack in the wall of a prison are basically very useful means: in one moment they show how dominion is vulnerable, point out who the enemy is and how diversified are the means to fight it back. Moreover they give everybody the chance of acting directly against the oppressors.
As concerns projects, we are just showing you, through deeds, how effective a project of multiple and co-ordinated attack can be. We are already putting into practice the anonymous dialogue between numerous groups of action, and this is certainly much more effective than any meeting open to the public, which, besides boring the attendants with the verbal catwalks of some refined lecturer, bring nothing more than new names to be added to the lists of repression… Au revoir! Revolt is contagious and can be reproduced.
2) Who is responsible for repression?
We have read or heard of comrades who, more or less openly, have talked about our unacceptable guilt. According to them, all the comrades who, like us, carry on wild struggles with wild methods and aiming at wild purposes are responsible for the waves of repression that periodically hit at the movement. It is true! Rebellion against the system and revolt against dominion create repression, no matter if the guarantors of innocence like it or not. Repression kills, tortures and locks people up; it is part of the State and is always there; it is the litmus paper of the deadly essence of dominion. It changes its forms and intensity, for example it can be more ‘indiscriminate’ when dominion is weak, but this is another story. If we prefer to oppose revolutionary violence to the violence of the State instead of being bored to death with a leaflet or a banner in our hands, the State will certainly produce its defensive antibodies… Our task is not only to inflict innocuous wounds but also to pave the way for further and more deadly blows. A State that allows you to protest and lets you parade in colourful and harmless ways knows that you are not even an already defeated enemy, but a clown down on his knees in front of the boss. We do not intend to adapt our practices in accordance with the fears of the clowns on duty.
3) A life of spectacle (the media and us)
The media and their relation with us have been the subject of animated discussion inside the movement for years. Beyond any simple sociological analysis and hypocrisy, it is evident that there exists the fear of being engulfed by the monster. ‘Recovery of dissent’ plans are the main concern of the strategies of dominion carried out by the democratic regime. The media are the spokesman and champion of these plans (consider, for example the no-global phenomenon). As a matter of fact, there is a TV set switched on in every cell of the Italian State prisons and newspapers are read. Similarly the hideous appliance can be found in every house (or so), hospital, public places, etc. Passing through the media (via TV, the press or internet) is risky but inevitable. We are lucky to be censured or misrepresented by it, but all of us, like it or not, must pass through the bloody media.
We are convinced that a cash machine is worth more if someone is interested in it besides its usual customers, and does something that can be imitated. We prefer it to be the effectiveness of the comrades’ actions that compel the press to talk about the latter, rather than their being moved to pity by harmless and picturesque demonstrators writing some indulgent article about it.
F.A.I./Fire and Similar Craftwork Cooperative
March 4 2004 – The request for the release of Sergio, Simone, Titto and Tombolino has been rejected once again by the judges of the Court of Cassation.
March 6 2005 – In the night a pressure cooker filled with herbicide blows up in Ostia (Rome) and damages part of a wall of the court and the windows of the surrounding buildings. A few local newspapers publish the text claiming the action, which is signed by the Anarchist Informal Federation – "Horst Fantazzini" Cell.
‘IN THE NIGHT OF MARCH 6, WE PLACED AN EXPLOSIVE DEVICE, MADE WITH A PRESSURE COOKER HIDDEN IN A FLOWER POT, OUTSIDE THE MAIN ENTRANCE OF OSTIA COURT. WE HAVE HIT AT ONE OF THE MANY PLACES WHERE EVERY DAY, WITH CYNICAL CALM, THOSE WHO DO NOT SUBMIT THEMSELVES ARE CONDEMNED TO YEARS AND YEARS IMPRISONMENT. AS WE REFUSE THE STATE AND ITS LAWS, WE ATTACK IT AND ANYTHING THAT KEEPS IT ALIVE, AND WE DO THIS WITH CYNICAL CALM. WITH THIS ACTION WE TAKE PART IN THE CAMPAIGN AGAINST PRISON THAT WAS LAUNCHED BY THE F.A.I./C.A.S.I. (FIRE AND SIMILAR CRAFTWORK COOPERATIVE). WE EXPRESS OUR SOLIDARITY TO THE COMRADES ARRESTED FOLLOWING THE MARINI INVESTIGATION, TO THE FOUR COMRADES ARRESTED FOLLOWING THE OPERTION CERVANTES AND TO THE ANARCHISTS ARRESTED IN GERMANY IN JUNE’.
March 7 2005 – The first hearing against Sergio and Agnese is held in Arezzo. A great number of comrades take part in the solidarity gathering organised for the occasion.
March 16 2005 – Massimo and Tombolino are cleared of the charges concerning the events THAT occurred on October 4 2004. As they had been arrested and accused of beating a cop, at the first degree trial they had been sentenced to one year’s imprisonment and to paying a fine of 1000 euros each.
March 19 2005 – A solidarity gathering is organised outside ‘Poggioreale’ prison in Naples, where Tombolino has been held for more than 8 months.
April 1 2005 – Another communiqué by Tombolino gets out of the prison:
‘Long live anarchy, no resignation ever.
On July 27 2004 the State, which spreads terror by creating internal enemies, arrested me and three other comrades following the operation "Cervantes". As usual, the accusations are related to 270 (subversive association) and 270bis. There are also other charges, for example I was accused of having sent the mail explosive device that caused a servant of the State to lose a few fingers, which implies that I could be charged with massacre. My responsibility in this event is attributed to a letter that I had written when I was held in Regina Coeli prison (12/12/03) because they had accused me of beating another servant of the State during the protest march which occurred on October 4 2003 in Rome; after one month in prison and three months under house arrest, the court of appeal in Rome cleared me. In the above-mentioned letter, there was a drawing of a hand with a few fingers missing and the writing: "more mutilated hands". Furthermore, they found other letters addressed to me in the same period (December 2003), where it was written: "more brave men around, more fingers around". This, according to them, is the evidence proving that I am guilty. I cannot explain why they arrested me after 5 months, given that the letters were found in my house, where I was under house arrest, on 20/02/04 during a search for weapons and drugs! Was it because the accusation was still being manufactured? As I refused to answer the questions of the judge (29/07/04), I was notified of an order of censorship on my mail. On 06/08/04 the lawyers made an appeal to the court, but no one took the responsibility of claiming that my arrest was not justified (I want to point out that as far as I’m concerned no arrest is justified, no matter if the arrested is guilty or not guilty). In the meantime I started a protest against this nth judicial frame-up against people who do not accept the rules of the State and rebel every day. The only possible protest I could undertake was a hunger strike by fits and starts, as I had health problems at the time. On 10/08/04 the court of appeal "finally" refused the request of release; I say "finally" because waiting in the hope of being released is real suffering for a prisoner, one of the worst. After a few days I decided to interrupt the hunger strike and react differently to hurting myself. Then I was denied the possibility of being visited by my partner (even if she was not investigated) and my family. Visits were allowed again only on September 13, after fifty days! I’ve been waiting and waiting for the official motivation for the refusal of the request for release, as another request cannot be presented if such motivations are not known. When the court finally let me know why I wouldn’t be released, I realized once more that this is nothing more than a frame-up. The text of the motivation is confused and full of contradictions, but no one, be it the public prosecutor or the judges, took the responsibility of deciding for my release. The lawyers are going to present another request to the Supreme Court on November 3. Meantime, solidarity to us has never stopped and I just hope that no repression will stop it! On the first days of November, various explosive devices blew up in Milan, and soon our cells were searched; an order of search, in fact, was sent to the direction of the four prisons where we are being held in order to find some evidence of a claim. I have to say that I was submitted to censorship of my mail at the time, all the same 6 Digos officers from Naples took a few letters and pamphlets away from my cell. On the first days of March other explosions occurred in the neighbourhood of carabinieri headquarters in Genoa and in Milan, and an explosive attack was carried out against a prison in Sardinia; the home office then declared: ‘Anarchists have intensified their attack in Sardinia, as they used a car containing a bomb instead of small explosions’. Do you think, therefore, that the reprisals against me are a "deterrent" to others? On December 16, during a hearing held in Viterbo for the squatting of abandoned and dilapidated houses in Bagnaia area (2001), I had the chance of seeing a lot of dear comrades I hadn’t seen for months. That was the most intense moment I had experienced in months, even if the deployment of cops was huge. Once again the "deterrent" methods of the State could be observed. On January 21 I experienced the same joy as I do every time I know that you are outside the prison walls and shout your anger out. On February 2 2005 censorship of my mail was dropped. On February 8 I was notified the nth warrant of investigation, as I was suspected, together with the F.A.I./international solidarity, of having sent a threatening letter to the director ("little pig") of Poggioreale prison (articles 610-110) on November 11 2004. Two days later I refused to be questioned by the investigators about the matter. This is another trick they used to put psychological pressure on me, and if I think of the absurdity of the accusation I can only laugh at it. But it is exactly this that I would like to discuss here: why all this pressure on us over the past few months? I dare say that our accusers hoped that we would resign ourselves to their dirty tricks. They wanted us to plead guilty and confirm what some miserable Digos officers and ROS carabinieri told the judges about us, after they worked hard to exploit phone tapping and build a frame up. It is good to have the certainty that not even one single anarchist ever resigns himself/herself to the violence of the State! I’ve never lost my spirit of rebellion nor have I given in to their provocations and humiliation. Even if I’m a prisoner I keep on struggling as I think right, and one of my methods of struggle is solidarity with the other prisoners: never have I turned a deaf ear to an argument between a prisoner and a guard. Unfortunately I realized that many prisoners don’t act like that, and they I asked me why I do. Those who know me can guess why, to those who don’t know me I want to say that selfishness is part of the brainwashing that power inflicts on people in order to keep the gap between oppressors and oppressed. At the beginning I thought that prisoners were more determined in struggling to get at least better living conditions, on the contrary I realize now how an illusory law like the ‘Gozzini’ appeased the anger and wiped away the situations that occurred in the Seventies and Eighties when a great number of prisoners would struggle fiercely to obtain their rights. Unfortunately I find it difficult to discuss anything deeply with other prisoners, and this hurts me. At least I think that everybody here is aware of the fact that the jailers deliberately isolate the ‘rebels’ among prisoners. I can tell you that isolation is not brought about by walls and bars, but it is given by the impossibility to talk about what one believes in. I’ve been waiting for the decision of the Cassation, which was supposed to be known on March 4, with great anxiety. But it happened that on March 3 the jailers came to me and told me that my father had died. It is quite difficult to accept that someone you love has died, but in this case it was even worse, as the jailers pretended they were sorry for me, and they had to shut up because of my expression of anger, especially towards them: ridiculous! On March 4 I was taken to my village for my father’s funeral, where besides the presence of many comrades who had come to support me, there also were a great number of cops. Quite a horrifying scene. This is not what my father would have liked to see! As usual, the cops try to exploit the situation to create "fear" of a dangerous terrorist. I think the terrorist is the State, which uses any little episode, be it related to anarchist struggle or to Muslim deeds, in order to condemn the suspect to years’ imprisonment. The following day I heard about the negative response of the Cassation.
Once again I claim I’m anarchist and I refuse any trial inflicted by the bourgeois State. From now on whoever opposes power, even if only in words, can find himself/herself in jail. But this will never bring our defeat! Even if I don’t believe in the justice of the State, I resolved not to refuse a defence and to attend all the hearings in order to see my comrades. I express my solidarity to all rebels and prisoners and I hope to see you at the Viterbo court on April 29, where we can show our anger against the oppressors.
Anarchist greetings to all of you!
Tombolino
April 2 2005 – During a gathering in solidarity to Tittarello, Alessio and the other prisoners organised outside ‘Le Vallette’ prison in Turin a few written contributions from the arrested comrades are distributed.
Communiqué from David Santini (Tittarello):
‘First of all, greetings to all those who take part in this gathering.
I would like to express a few considerations about our arrest and our situation as prisoners. I’ll sum up our story for those who don’t know it: on July 27 2004 three comrades and I were arrested on order of the public prosecutor in Rome, and accused of belonging to a subversive association. In particular, we are accused of having carried out various attacks against institutional sites. I’ve been held in the High Surveillance section of ‘Le Vallette’ prison in Turin for more than two months. Here I had the chance of meeting and discussing with people who, like me, are living as prisoners. The reasons why we are detained as well as our single views on the subject are of course different from one another, but in fact we all are in the same boat. As I talked a lot with my companions in prison, I realized how widespread the infamous practice of tampering with phone tapping is, sometimes even inventing them totally. Ingenuously I thought that when the investigators did this to me it was for personal revenge against me (of course it also is). On the contrary, at least 10% of the prisoners I spoke to were victims of the same cowardly practice. In other words, in order to justify our arrest, the investigators took single words from hours of conversation and ended up creating statements we never made. This is something we should discuss and be worried about. When the investigators can’t demonstrate that someone is guilty by employing "legal" means, they turn to this practice. What do they have to lose? Nothing, of course, absolutely nothing. Moreover, a great deal of money would be needed in order to show how our phone tapping was manipulated, which makes the thing very difficult. So the responsibility of these gentlemen stays unstained. They can claim that there were some mistakes in the transcription and carry on with their dirty job. The prisoner, meantime, keeps on thinking over the statements that he/she never said, and so days, months and sometimes even years pass. In my opinion this is a new and very effective practice of repression: it strikes hard and is used in silence. Of course the servant press is more than happy when social rebels like anarchists are arrested. On the contrary it is not so happy with the truth. That is why not a single line is written about how the arrests develop. Sensationalism is created by the gravity of the inflicted sentences, and not by chance Italy is the country where phone tapping is most used. Even the justice minister Castelli, who is known for being all but magnanimous, admitted that there exists a problem concerning phone tapping, and the telephone company Tim complained about the same thing. It is in this context that the various investigators work, and they cut, manipulate and invent conversations. In spite of all this, if someone complains is only because their privacy has been violated. No one says a word about the many prisoners who are still in prison because they can’t afford a good technician to demonstrate that their phone tapping is false. This is another example of how life today is controlled and monitored by repression. And it is also another reason for subverting all this as soon as possible.
David Santini, an anarchist detained in High Surveillance regime
Communiqué from Sergio Maria Stefani:
‘I take this opportunity to greet you, Titto and Alessio, so that you can hear my words instead of reading them from a piece of paper. I’m sure that those who are going to shout out from their cell feel the same anger that twists my guts, the same passion that runs in my veins and the same brotherhood that unites us. Their voice will therefore sound as mine would do. I’d like to shout myself and let you know how I feel and to embrace you as I used to do once, but the current situation compels me to use written words. So, before I become rhetorical, I want to say that I’m with you!
You just stroke the bars of your cell, and take one of them with you when you get out: we will soften it with the flames of our anger and mould it under the blows of our determination. And when the iron is sharpened enough and filled with the memories of all the abuses we endured, we will use it to lash out at our enemies so that the latter will be able to taste their own weapons, but turned against them this time. I’m sure that you will resist and get out with your head held high. I just hope you will have the same smile you had before and I can’t wait to embrace you again.
I’d also like to show my solidarity and complicity to the other prisoners of ‘Le Vallette’ concentration camp, not because they are victims of the violence of the State but because they challenged the laws of power. I’m much closer to social rebels than to the many anarchists who vomit words and never act. I’ve nothing to say to the comrades in struggle, as they know very well what the horror of prison is like and they feel instinctively that locking up men and women in a cage is unacceptable.
A protest gathering outside a prison is very important and it gives the imprisoned comrades and all prisoners the chance to hear the greetings of those outside, and this gives them great strength. Most importantly, gatherings outside prisons break the silence and remind everybody that it is men and women, and not ‘criminals’, who are locked up. And that these men and women suffer violence and humiliation at the hands of the jailers every day; that the most hideous form of violence and the most serious crime is to take a man or a woman’s freedom away. Furthermore we are anarchists and we want to demonstrate that we don’t intend to stop our struggle and that we know how to fight back, especially when repression gets harder. They are wrong if they think that locking up comrades is a means to stop the struggle; in fact it is not: someone else will take the imprisoned comrades’ weapons. And they are wrong if they think that hitting at rebels is a means to discourage rebellion; in fact our anger makes us more determined in the struggle. If, inside the prison, they hope to defeat those who made war on the existent, they are wrong again. And if they hope that those who are outside will limit their actions and become the cops of themselves, they are proved wrong by initiatives like this. If, in fact, they hope our comrades will give up direct action because we are being held, we prisoners incite all of you comrades to celebrate our freedom here and now, as we are kidnapped by the State. We will dance at the sound of your screams, our cells will be lit up by the flames of one thousand fires, and we will always toast to any act of rebellion and solidarity. You never stop struggling and we will be close to you as free men and women, even if we are in prison.
A free comrade, who is today with you outside ‘Le Vallette’ prison, not innocent but guilty of having loved and wanted freedom too much’.
Communiqué from Simone Del Moro:
‘Dear comrades, first of all I want to thank you for your support, your letters, the economic aid and all the solidarity initiatives: the latter are particularly important for a prisoner, and they show to those who want to break the solidarity that binds us that prison and repression will never take us apart. I assure you that hearing the voices of the comrades outside the infamous prison walls or in the courtroom warms the heart and makes us more willing to carry on the struggle. I also want to assure you that the eight months I spent in jail didn’t extinguish my rebellious spirit, the same that pushed me to fight against this system based on inequality, a system that would like all of us to be like automaton, gears for the capitalist machinery that creates slavery and exploitation.
This experience has just strengthened my hatred towards any form of authority. As I live inside this mix of concrete, bars and cameras, I understood that there’s not much difference between the outside and the inside of a prison. The extreme control and total lack of freedom that we experience here are not so different from the days outside prison, beaten by the prostitution of work and by the control inflicted by all the cameras that spy at every street corner. Prison is just the most hideous face of a system based on laws that guarantees the right of the exploiters to exploit the exploited, a system that aims at repressing any attempt of re-taking possession of one’s life, of one’s time and of one’s space. I’ve got no solutions to put forward; I just think that struggling with any means necessary is the only way out. As long as I’m forced to live inside here, I’ll keep on holding my head high, as millions of men and women do, and I won’t sell out my dignity of man and of rebel. We have got nothing to lose because a life without freedom isn’t worth living. We must keep on struggling for our freedom and for anarchy. I will never stop showing my solidarity towards those who contribute to subverting social peace. A big rebel and revolutionary hug to all of you and to all men and women kidnapped by the State.
Simone
‘Greetings (from Marco Camenish) on the occasion of the initiative organised outside ‘Le Vallette’ prison on April 2 2005 in solidarity to Davide and Alessio and against any form of repression and prison. From the exile of a Swiss prison, I send a brotherly hug of solidarity to you, Davide and Alessio, and warm, brotherly greetings and solidarity to all comrades in jail, to all comrades in struggle in the anarchist revolutionary movement in Italy, and to all comrades in the struggle for social revolution, for life, for justice and for freedom! Both in the struggle and in jail, the only weapon we have and that can’t be defeated is the continuity of our coherence! Anarchy is free life in solidarity, anarchy is alive only in the struggle and in the revolutionary solidarity against dominion, exploitation, destruction, and repression. After thousands years of horror, slavery and destruction, the patriarchal civilization of capitalist technology has never been so globally widespread and destructive as it is today, nor has it been so advanced. It is also in such a state that it generates social and ecological crisis, which is as serious as it is global. For this reason, and not only, woman, that is to say the feminine world, is the natural and necessary guide in the revolutionary struggle for the natural right to life, freedom, equality. It is the natural and necessary guide for re-conquering and maintaining the continuity of life through a communitarian and egalitarian existence between the genres. It is the natural guide and sentry of life and of social-revolutionary struggle against dominion, exploitation and destruction. Not only can it get over thousands of years of drift that life and humanity have endured in the patriarchal society, but it also has a natural and peculiar competence, which reflects into the reproduction and care of life and survival. No solidarity, equality and respect for the peculiarities of the genres can exist without social revolution. There can’t be any social revolution against dominion and exploitation without women and children, without the natural feminine guide. There will be no union between the sexes without the feminine guide; and this union is necessary to destroy the capitalist, technologist and patriarchal society, which is a monster that is eating our life and our home. Our home is the whole world, in the most immediate and deep sense. And when repression grows and becomes international, the solidarity in the international social-revolutionary struggle against repression and prison is natural and necessary. This struggle has strengthened alongside the crisis of the system and its contradictions. The anarchist, revolutionary and international contribution of resistance and attack is widespread and vital to reach liberation from every form of prison and repression and for the defence of those who are so badly hit because of their revolutionary struggle for freedom. In the last few years, this contribution has turned the struggle against prison from a humanitarian one into one that is militant and revolutionary. This process, along with the effects of the crisis of the system, which are getting clearer and clearer, makes the struggle of revolutionaries in prison more and more comprehensible and open. Most importantly, this process fills the gap between us, revolutionaries in prison, and the struggle for freedom and resistance that are going on. This is decisive for our identity and ability to take part in the struggle and in life itself. We can therefore contribute to binding the past, present and future struggle with our memory and our experience. We can contribute to keeping alive the awareness of tradition and revolution, which is vital to strengthen and motivate the struggle. For life and freedom: revolutionary international solidarity against prison and repression, equality between the sexes in the social revolutionary and ecologist struggle led by women! Let’s destroy the destructive horror called patriarchy!’
Marco, from Regensdorf prison, March 2005.
April 4 2005 – A number of comrades attend the trial in the Arezzo court, where Sergio is sentenced to 2 years 8 month imprisonment, and Agnese is sentenced to 2 years 4 month on bail.
The anger of the comrades explodes inside the court at the cry of ‘servants of the servants of the servants’, and then in the streets of Arezzo, where a march takes place spontaneously. The march is led with the banner ‘Comrades in the struggle, brothers in the heart – Free Sergio’, and leaves a number of writings on the walls. At the end of the march, anti-riot cops attack the demonstrators and one of them is arrested and accused of resisting and injuring an officer. The day after, the arrested comrade is tried summarily and released.
April 7 2005 – After nearly nine month’s imprisonment, Sergio is conceded house arrest.




A FEW WORDS ON THE ARRESTS OF OPERATION CERVANTES
The arrests of operation ‘Cervantes’ present undoubtedly a ‘preventive’ aspect: the State is trying to accelerate its work, and doing the cleaning before it gets too busy. Furthermore, as in any ‘repressive’ operation, a warning to those who want to act against this unacceptable existent is implied. Through these arrests, the State also tries to gain consensus and give reassurance to the spectators of dominion.
It is clear, however, that the arrests are part of a strategy of the State that we will call ‘repressive’ for greater convenience (in fact, the State’s power is always repressive, in its own nature and in all its aspects).
It may be this that makes these arrests, along with the investigation on the C.O.R. (Revolutionary Offensive Cells) in Pisa, a paradigm of a readjustment concerning not only repressive practices aiming at hitting at a certain area of the movement against dominion, but also of a new redistribution of tasks and power inside the apparatus of the State. In other words, it is the paradigm of readjustment of the whole police-judiciary procedure that has been undertaken so far. After all, the fact that public prosecutors are the main force in the attacks against radical opposition is not denied, even from a legal point of view.
Already a few years ago, a ministerial decree freed the forces of repression from any judiciary impeachment (agreed that the latter has never been a problem for repression), and stated that investigations carried out without the permission of the judiciary were legitimate provided that the prime minister knew about them.
Another example: dozens of jokes about the contrast between police and carabinieri have made us laugh for years. Today, following whatever raid in whatever area, some police inspector (or more rarely some senior carabinieri officer) makes statements to the media claiming that the operation has been successfully carried out thanks to the perfect agreement and synergy between police and carabinieri. Reality is obviously different and it is clear that the two forces compete for investigations, prestige and power, sometimes even harshly.
For example, when the Arma dei Carabinieri were elected the fourth force of the police, the latter tried to oppose this and even bought space in the newspapers in order to give vent to their opposition. Furthermore, the two forces put a spoke in each other’s wheel more than once when it came to undertaking operations that were particularly important for ‘internal security’, like the one against the new Brigate Rosse. On that occasion, the Digos hastily arrested Alessandro Geri in the attempt to anticipate their ‘adversary’ the R.O.S.-carabinieri special unit (Alessandro Geri, arrested on May 16 2000 and detained for 11 days, had been accused of being the telephonist of the Brigate Rosse and of being involved in the murder of Massimo D’Antona).
Certainly, the R.O.S. deserve a few notes. Officially created as an internal department inside the Arma dei Carabinieri, the R.O.S. seem to have the body of a carabiniere and the mind of a secret service agent. Their investigative methods are characterized not only by the accurate search for any piece of evidence against their poor victim, but also by the creation of an illegal net that reproduces and finances itself. Think of the cocaine refinery in Pescara, installed by the R.O.S. which the latter ‘raided’ under the cameras. Think of their trafficking net of drugs, self-made or imported, not so much for gaining money as for showing off magnificent and sensational efficiency. Think of the creation of such myths as ‘the Ultimate Official’, which had to capture mafia boss Toto Riina and divert public attention from the agreements between the Mafia and the State. All these are examples of the strategy and methods that the R.O.S. employ to forge their reputation and to be recognised as the only body that can manage repression efficiently.
One of the founders of the R.O.S., Mario Mori, was nominated leader of the S.I.S.D.E. [an Italian secret service, translator’s note] in 2001, moving the balance between police and the Arma in favour of the latter and of its modus operandi that, as mentioned before, is basically planned in advance. It is a strategy of repression that allows whatever pre-planned thesis to be made credible to the judiciary, a formality still necessary in a democratic context. It is not important that the guarantees involved are elsewhere, what matters is that investigations are made in order for them to get results.
If the law and the rules are the instrument that dominion uses to defend itself and the plunder carried out against the exploited, and if legality is nothing other than the exercise of the violence of State – and this is true no matter which police apparatus imposes it – we are witnessing (and not just from now) a change that must be understood to avoid ingenuous misunderstandings.
This is particularly pertinent as concerns the so-called operation ‘Cervantes’.
If we look at their respective arrest warrants, David and Simone are being held because of bugging that constitutes a self-accusation from one of the two; then telephone calls and an attack against the Viterbo court carried out in January before the operation are mentioned, and this, according to the investigators, implies the complicity of the other.
Sergio was re-arrested by the R.O.S. on order of the public prosecutor in Rome while being held under house arrest since the previous May, on orders of the public prosecutor in Arezzo and following an attack against a butcher’s shop carried out in March 2004. As Sergio’s case came under the competence of the public prosecutor in Arezzo, the one in Rome, who wanted to take him away from his colleague, accused him, besides carrying out the attack in Arezzo, also of belonging, along with Simone, David and Marco and dozens of other comrades, to a subversive association.
As for Marco, he is accused of having sent a number of letter bombs to various sites of dominion. The evidence against him is a letter, addressed to him and seized by the R.O.S. during a house search, which contains the drawing of a hand with three fingers missing. According to the investigators, that hand would be the one of carabinieri marshal from Rome, Mr Sindona, who had incautiously opened an explosive letter.
At first sight, the official motivations for the arrests therefore appear ridiculous and laughable. It would have been easy to publish them and point out that the operation ‘Cervantes’ is mere ‘frame-up’. If we had done so, however, we would have legitimated a position that, on a theoretical level, criticises the violence of the State but claims that it can be maintained after correcting its abuses.
In this way we would have looked at the finger and not at the moon that it points to.
These arrests are the result of the manipulation of reality, made in such a clumsy way that we must ask ourselves why all this dullness.
We have already exposed the context in which the arrests were made. Now we must highlight how this operation reminds, even in the lexicon, of another coarse investigation – also made by the R.O.S.: the so-called operation Pontelungo (vulgarly known as ‘Marini investigation’).
It was the end of the Nineties.
And it was in April 2004 that the Court of Cassation, the body with final power of decision, declared the existence of an armed band, formed by ‘the anarchist group of Rome’, and the arrest, on various accusations, of a number of comrades who are still in jail or under house arrest, when not in hiding or having already served more years than the ones given by the final sentence, for previous and different condemnations.
A few days before, home secretary Pisanu had announced this sentence in a speech to the parliament. Falling in contradiction, he had claimed that there existed an armed band formed by anarchists that did not conform to any pattern covered by the penal code. Those who suggested the speech to him, and who are certainly more powerful than a little judge (but we are not diminishing the seriousness of the latter’s responsibilities), had decided in advance not only the comrades’ condemnation but also the follow-up attack against the archipelago of anarchist radical opposition.
However, the result of operation Pontelungo – extremely heavy for the comrades who were involved in it and for all the people close to them who want them to be free – wasn’t as successful as dominion had wished. In fact, the initial hypothesis, a large subversive association formed as an armed band called the O.R.A.I. by the R.O.S., is even more faltering than expected. The ‘national’ investigation centred in the hands of a unique super-power of attorney, therefore, has not given the desired results.
This explains why, during the years between operation Pontelungo and operation ‘Cervantes’, hundreds of investigations have been carried out, no longer by a unique power of attorney, as it was for the former, but scattered throughout the country.
It doesn’t take a great intellectual effort to understand how this disjointedness is only apparent and that all these investigations, so apparently different from one another, are all coordinated; and this had been clearly declared on various occasions, even if in a whisper, by former home secretary Bianco.
There might be another reason why the investigations, that is to say attacks on anarchists, have been carried out by local public prosecutors in the areas where the comrades lived (with the exception of the one led by judge Dambruoso, which came into light in 2001) in recent years: on the one hand dominion seems to find the penal code quite inadequate to its needs, on the other it seems that the apparatus of the State is not a monolithic block but, like capital, is troubled by tensions, altercations and internal fights. As concerns the first aspect, we have the impression that the authorities are trying to sort the problem out. From time to time, at regular intervals, Dambruoso, who obtained the title of anti-terrorism consultant inside the U.N. also thanks to his repressive activity against anarchists (when he was a young public prosecutor he played the main role in the sentencing of a comrade, Patrizia, for an attack against Milan town hall), complains about the inadequacy of the current law in clamping down anarchists under investigation all over in Italy. Others, including the home secretary, sing the same song. A little adjustment to the penal code has been made with article 270ter, which exacerbates punishment for those who are accused of subversive association and for their friends, and which widens the duration of preventive arrests and of investigation. Moreover, following the recent attacks claimed by the F.A.I., ‘someone’ pushed Pisanu into declaring that the former, even if it is not an oligarchic structure, must be considered as an armed band, with all the implications that the penal code states.
After all, waiting for the creation of the national antiterrorism super power of attorney (supposed to be like the D.I.A., Antimafia Investigative Direction), requested by Giovanni Pellegrino, former president of the anti-massacre commission, and strongly desired by antimafia national prosecutor Pier Luigi Vigna – the man who stands for the judiciary as Andreotti stands for politics - the step immediately preceding is already a reality, that is to say the possibility for super powers of attorney to act over more extended areas than it would be possible for single public prosecutors.
In this context, operation Cervantes is an attempt to re-open the season of big national investigations. This is why the investigation pivots on the F.A.I., even if the attacks that the comrades are accused of are not claimed by the F.A.I.
The fact that there exists in Rome an investigation of the F.A.I. means that the power of attorney that carried out operation Pontelungo is very likely to launch another attack against the anarchist archipelago.
If things stand this way and if the evidence against Sergio, Simone, David and Marco is clearly ridiculous, then repression does not fear the grotesque, on the contrary it flaunts it.
What keeps these and other comrades locked up is the will of dominion to make victims among its enemies.
Dominion is vindictive.
No less are the exploited.
The freedom of all the exploited passes through the attack against dominion.
Everybody takes his/her weapons.
Solidarity is revolt!

Here are a few contributions to this pamphlet that Tombolino, Tittarello, Sergio and Simone sent from the prison.
A LETTER FROM TOMBOLINO FROM POGGIOREALE PRISON IN NAPLES.
17/10/2004
‘Dear comrades of the Cassa Anarchica di Solidarieta’ Anticarceraria (Anarchist Fund of Anti-Prison Solidarity), I’m writing first of all to let you know that my physical and mental conditions are good and my mood is high and proud, in spite of the continuous "psycho-physical" violence of the jailers. I’ve been held in a punishment cell since January 13 and I’ll be staying here until January 20. I was inflicted this model punishment by the director of the prison after I had an altercation with a guard. They said that I called "ignorant" one guard or more. Honestly, I don’t remember if I did; but I don’t think there’s anything wrong in expressing my view, which will be no different once I get out of this "hole". They took me here because they think that they can turn me into a puppet, but they are wrong. In fact, the more I’m abused the more I react. Anyway I’m in a cold, dark and damp cell, without TV (which is the only good point) or the possibility to walk out and cook. As for the light and the chance of smoking, I have to ask permission from the guard. As I don’t care a fuck about the lights and smoking, nothing has changed since I’m confined in the "Venezia" section (ex 41bis). Prison is something to be condemned in any circumstance, no matter whether it’s as harsh as this one or a little better, as it is for my co-defendants, whom I’m happy for as much as they are angry as concerns my situation. I keep on going and I try not to think of where I am or of the time I’ve to be here, which is long for sure. I also make a treasure of the many emotional moments I experience as a prisoner. I read quite a lot and I answer all the letters that the comrades write to me. Sergio warned me that someone didn’t receive the answer: that is because I didn’t get the letter. Besides writing to Sergio, Tittarello and Simone, I also write to other prisoners. I have to say that your letters and telegrams are extremely important to me because they give me strength, hope, will to struggle and show me how many people share my same ideas and methods. At least I found a good "companion" with whom I can walk a couple of hours per day, the rest of which I spend in the cell. Time, however, passes even too quickly. Nobody can stop it and freedom will arrive for me sooner or later, whereas the jailers will always be prisoners, as they are servants of power and submit themselves to it every day. Now I’d like to talk about our projects. I think that the idea of the anarchist fund is good, even if it requires some continuity, but I know that you will make it. I take this opportunity to let you know that my economic situation isn’t so good, my partner being the only person who helps me. But you think of those who are in a worse condition first of all. As concerns the pamphlet, I like the idea, even if I know that most people don’t give a shit about counter-information and trust TV news and the press of the State without reserve. This doesn’t mean a thing, of course, we have to go ahead with our ideas. In theory I can receive everything (pamphlets, books, etc), but there’s always the possibility that I’m not given it. Anyway I’m happy if you try to send me stuff. For now, besides this letter, I don’t know how I can help you with the pamphlet. I might write something in the future.
I send you a big hug and I greet you with my head held always high!!
Tombolino
LETTER FROM TITTARELLO FROM ‘LE VALLETTE’ PRISON IN TURIN
19/11/2004
So I became anarchist. I was
attracted by that great idea of freedom and
of complete justice that is anarchy,
but also by the disinterested passion
anarchists take up in their struggle
for the demolition of the existent social regime.
I think that it is only us, the anarchists,
who are the real defenders of freedom.
It is only us who understand
all its value, and we sacrifice everything for it
because it is everything for us.’
Michele Shirru 1931.
‘Dear comrades, as you know I have been held in ‘Le Vallette’ prison in Turin for nearly four months. The situation in here hasn’t changed since I was arrested. I’m in a section for prisoners who committed crimes that can be compromising for their safety in a common section. These crimes include paedophilia, rape, exploitation of and abetting prostitution. Furthermore in this section High Surveillance prisoners are held, but they are forbidden to meet other prisoners, some because they are considered dangerous, some because submitted to a punishment regime (art 17bis). My situation comes out from the ‘notes’ drawn up by the Justice Ministry, that describe me as a dangerous terrorist. That is why the director of this prison maintains that the section in which I am being held is the only one where safety can be guaranteed.
They arrested me because I was accused of belonging to a subversive association acting under various names but under a common reference called Anarchist Informal Organisation (F.A.I.).
I’m very glad to contribute with this writing and to try to explain the reasons why three comrades and myself were arrested, and, most importantly, the reasons for this nth campaign against the anarchist movement. First of all, I want to say that my comrades from Viterbo and I have been involved in the struggle against prison and repression for more than seven years in our town. For seven years we have tried to spread a point of view that is antagonistic to the ‘produce-consume-die’ one. In other words, an anarchist, anti-authoritarian, anti-capitalist and anti-sexist point of view. We have always been in the piazzas, and have organised demos against war, repression and social control. During all these years, there have been a lot of attempts by the judiciary and the police to clamp down on our struggle activities. The endless string of warrants that we received on the occasion of any initiative that disturbs the social peace that those responsible for this unjust society care so much about was disgusting. The ever-growing anti-terrorism alarm stirred up by the journalists servants of power crashed against the incompetence of the investigators. Along with home secretary Pisanu’s absurd claims linking anarchists to old and new Red Brigades without any logic at all, the number of direct attacks made by unknown people against symbols of power was increasing. Hence the raving search for scapegoats in order to appease public opinion in ferment. This search ended up with our arrest. When they couldn’t arrest anarchists with valid evidence, they made it through the manipulation of environmental tapping. Contacts, friendships, human and social relations are for the investigators complicity to be repressed while comrades’ houses are dens where attacks are planned. The attempt to dampen any solidarity that appears naturally between anarchists is obvious. I’ll keep on defending my identity as anarchist who has nothing to do with vertical or horizontal associations, and showing solidarity towards those who struggle using the means they like the most. What led to our arrest, therefore, is an example of power’s strategy. This is the real face of democracy: whoever tries to oppose society as it is today is repressed and arrested. This is also the mirror of the alienation of society. The current situation is no doubt tragic and resignation to it is widespread. The apathy dominion wants us to be confined into does not derive from the fact that the exploited agree with society, but from the lack of enthusiasm in the belief that society can be disrupted. People keep on going by force of habit, and not because they are convinced. What they are convinced of is that things will never change and that it is pointless to try to think of a different world. We should play on this and interact with those who are exploited every day and experience in first person, as we do, discrimination and repression by the dominant. If we explain our reasons, we can manage to have them shared and understood better. All this must come without us betraying our principles and our desires. I don’t think it is useful to have confrontation between ‘the converted’ only. What I would like to criticise, and the critique concerns myself too, is the fact that we are not enough involved in the struggles around us. I certainly don’t mean that we have to ride them, but that we have to be close to those who, extraneous to any institution and union, carry out these struggles. I think that we have to be in the streets more often, in the piazzas and in all the places where repression shows its face. And it is exactly there that, through our methods and our publications, we have to contrast all the mystification put forward by the journalists of the regime and say clearly that all States are the real terrorists. I’m sure that many people are interested in our ideas, but they are unfortunately frightened by the terror campaigns that are systematically stirred up, and they don’t dare join us. I’m aware that I’m not saying anything new and that I might seem banal, but I often realise how at times we stay stuck to our positions without looking at the society around us objectively. I hope that my contribution can give you the chance to reflect on a few points, which wouldn’t be bad. Coming back to my situation, I’d like to be informed about the initiatives that are being carried out. It is extremely important that what happens outside is known inside so that other more insuperable walls don’t add to the already existing prison ones. I take this opportunity to express solidarity to the comrades arrested during the gathering in Rome, which was charged by police, to those who demonstrated their rage outside the prisons in Turin and Viterbo, to the comrades investigated and arrested following the investigation in Pisa, to my co-defendants and the other investigated in the operation Cervantes, to all those who still believe that a new world is possible and, most importantly, to all prisoners who, even if locked up, keep on struggling…’
Greetings from Titto, ‘Le Vallette’ prison
SERGIO’S CONTRIBUTION FROM
PALMI PRISON
(received on 22/01/05)
‘The Cervantes operation is nothing original; it is the nth clumsy attempt to put down an uncomfortable reality. It is not at all surprising that it is an attack against anarchists, old thorn in the side of Italian democratic dictatorship. The only thing is that you can see the trick: Pisanu and his cops are not good magicians and this frame-up can’t be hidden inside the wide sleeves of public prosecutors’ gowns. But how come professional investigators run into all these difficulties and what is the reason for their fury? The main difficulty that keen and zealous investigators must cope with is easy to imagine: there exists no anarchist organisation! I mean, anarchist action is absolutely incompatible with any sluggish vertical organisation having a unique ideological identity.
What cop Pisanu, who must answer for his incapacity in imposing social peace, is mostly nervous about is the fact that a great number of actions, even small, are spreading and are fast imitated by other comrades. In this way, it is impossible to get hold of the anarchist movement, which in turn always supports the comrades hit by repression (through both public initiatives and re-launching the struggle the comrades were arrested for, sometimes lashing at specific targets responsible for the current repression). It is not at all easy to enclose a movement claiming its ideas openly into the boundaries of anti-terrorism laws, a movement that, precisely through direct action (theory becoming practice), can show the truthfulness of its analysis and the depth of its critique. These actions include acts of sabotage and mail explosive devices and their targets are antennas, structures linked to the horror of prison, Benetton shops and animal-breeding farms. And if it is true that I consider my co-defendants as my comrades, it is also true, as power itself admits, that we don’t always know one another. As those who enjoy exercising their power and their ‘justice’ on others don’t give up their murderous desires so easily, they need to find something to justify their operations. Theories of double levels weren’t enough for them, so they found inspiration in the F.A.I., the organisation they were looking for! They certainly don’t see how the communiqués from the F.A.I. are appeals for the re-launch of direct action addressed to the most radical and sincere part of the anarchist movement; nor do they see how F.A.I. proposals for carrying out specific campaigns and attacking specific targets can’t be considered as orders for the attacks given from above. Finally, they can’t see how one can be close to a prisoner sharing one’s own desires, even if there’s no direct knowledge between the two.
This cannot stop us. If we consider operation Cervantes without including it in the latest repressive acts, we can’t evaluate the national character of the latter. It is useless to consider these four arrests and the investigation warrants as if they were exclusively aimed at hitting the people involved. If they chose us to be able to say that they arrested someone (and I want to point out that it is absurd that they accuse us with 270, 270bis and with anything more, and that the actions serve as an excuse to keep us locked up; so that, even if we were cleared of them, this wouldn’t be enough for us to get out), it is us who must cope with prison, each one following his/her ability and everyone with the comrades’ support. But the reaction of the movement must be different. The fact that very few actions are being carried out depends, I’m afraid, on the blackmail of us being in prison. It is authentic blackmail, as shown by the searches inflicted after the solidarity actions in Milan.
A great number of comrades write to us, and this is the best way to cheer up our daily prison life. We can do a lot of analysis about operation Cervantes, and a lot of points of view will certainly come out. And those who are outside will certainly be able to consider things more clearly and wisely. I can only say that we prisoners must not deny our desires, not even for a single moment, otherwise repression would win. I hope to hear, besides all the comrades’ cries of anger, also the explosions of it coming from outside. I also hope that thousands of solidarity fires will soon burn the towns and light up the grey walls of the prison. Don’t worry about us, our freedom is the belief that we are still part of the struggle.
Sergio
SIMONE’S CONTRIBUTION FROM THE PRISON IN CARINOLA (18/04/05)
If we analyse carefully and understand what’s going on, if we have a clear vision of political repression, we will be able to engage in effective struggles to fight back the new repressive attacks inflicted on us by the State. Although it isn’t exactly correct to call them new attacks, as the only new element are the hangmen who investigate and sign the arrest warrants, whereas the ‘’modus operandi" and the theorems are the same as usual.
The foundation of this investigation, in fact, is the same as ten years ago, the same theorem that was made up by the R.O.S. and taken to the court by judge Marini. The aim of their operations is to present to the court the existence of an organisation with roots all over the country, with links abroad (Spain and Greece) and acting according to the double level theorem.
The first level, the so-called "open" one, includes any initiative that contrasts trends imposed by the democratic regime and aims at spreading ideas and information about everything that the press servant of power conceals or manipulates following the will of the powerful on duty; in other words, all those who refuse institutional information and act outside its pre-planned spaces.
The other level, the "hidden" one, includes those who carry on attacks against the structure of dominion and exploitation.
If the investigating judges managed to create a link between the two levels (which actually only exist in the delirious and murderous mind of the cops) based on a criterion of propaganda and deed, and on a military organisation with different roles, collaborators, leaders and theoreticians, they would be able to lock up dozens of anarchists in Italian prisons on accusations of associative crimes. So far, they have not been able to achieve this because the horizontal organisation of anarchists and their spontaneous way of acting, without leaders nor structures, does not fit to the investigators’ oligarchic conception of the existent. Home secretary Pisanu recently declared that insurrectionist anarchists pretend to be a spontaneous phenomenon in order to avoid being accused by a court of being an armed gang, but that they actually have one unique and relatively restricted direction. This declaration leaves little space to interpretation.
Through searches and controls the judiciary is trying to hit as many comrades as possible. Dozens of investigations against comrades are a clear attempt to narrow direct action, a phenomenon that seems to be widening more and more all over the territory.
This is particularly important at a time like this, when social tension is stronger and institutional forms of opposition, i.e. political parties and unions always ready to stem the people’s unrest, are loosing credibility.
By maintaining a state of emergency, institutions create conditions favourable for justifying their dirty way and limiting the freedom of everybody, militarising the territory and increasing control and repression. That is how any action aimed at demonstrating something becomes an attempted massacre; meantime the zealous work of bloody journalists presents the only terrorist – the State – as the most effective bastion erected for the defence of freedom against hordes of barbarians thirsty for blood.
If, on the one hand, our arrest can be considered as the response of the State to the many attacks inflicted on it over the last two months and a demonstration of the efficiency of internal security, on the other I don’t think they can be considered as an isolated fact. They are part of a wider and more articulated anti-revolutionary attack.
As they don’t have any evidence that allows them to operate on a wide range, they made the first arrests in the hope of being able to use this provocation to check those who move around us, out of solidarity or simple affection. They are therefore exercising tight control (inside as well as outside) with the aim of finding any word or any little element that can be used to give credibility to their faltering accusatory theorem. They want to open new investigations in order to strengthen the accusations. Democratic totalitarianism does not tolerate any form of social opposition that cannot be recuperated, hence the many investigations undertaken by the cops and the forcing of judicial procedures. All this shows how they want to legitimate the process of annihilating any opposition.
Any instinct of freedom has to be eliminated, as demonstrated by the mystification of democracy and its huge work of brainwashing. People must believe that struggles aimed at conquering real freedom are a threat and not a way to put an end to imposed life-styles, controlled and confined into spaces that cannot be contested, hidden behind a well-made mask.
I’m not interested in claiming my innocence nor do I intend to formulate any reassuring critique of the cops’ procedures.
I don’t think that the procedure employed to kidnap me is an aberration of the law. Laws exist to guarantee the centuries-old exploitation of the exploiters over the exploited, and everybody knows that the reason of State justifies everything. I don’t expect justice from any court, which is the main expression of this system of injustice and State violence.
I claim now, and I’ll be claiming forever, my identity as a rebel anarchist, and I express solidarity to those who struggle against this existent-prison.
With endless anger towards the oppressors and a lot of affection in my heart for you, my comrades.
A rebel hug.
Simone

We received this letter:
Dear comrades,
I’m writing to let you know a about very serious thing that happened to me a few days ago, but which, in a sense, concerns all comrades.
The other day, when I was coming out of gymnastics, I was approached by a car whose passengers apparently wanted to ask something. As soon as the car stopped, a dark-haired man aged around forty, with a pointed beard and about 1.75 metres tall, got out. I soon realised it wasn’t anything good. I was surprised when he called me by name. Then, in a friendly and familiar manner, he introduced himself as an employee of the home ministry.
You can imagine how I felt at that moment: a thousand thoughts and conjectures ran in my head and I was overcome by paranoia. Not long after, however, all the smog that was in my brain lifted and I understood the situation with terrible clarity.
The guy, in fact, started saying that ‘they’ were carrying out a ‘study’ on the so-called anarchist movement. They needed someone who, from the inside, was willing to collaborate and give information in exchange for a suitable reward. As soon as these words were pronounced and an expression of disgust came over my face, this shady guy started to reassure me, and he said that I had no reason to be worried, that they were not looking for a ‘vile spy’ and that they were just undertaking some research (on the anarchist movement). Then, smiling, he added that my reward would be, from an economic point of view, something much higher than a simple salary. As I recovered from the shock, my reaction was clearly quite hostile towards him. In fact, after having told him to go to hell, I warned him to leave me alone and not to look for me any more, and I said that I was not interested in their dirty proposals nor was I willing to have any relationship with them whatsoever.
But unfortunately this story didn’t end there. A few days later, in fact, the same guy approached me as I was leaving home. In a slightly threatening but at the same time alluring attitude, he promised that my criminal record would be cleared and my judicial troubles sorted out if I collaborated. I would also be offered a coffee…
To be brief, I sent him to hell once again.
My impression is that they didn’t want to get information from me so much as they wanted me to sign a piece of paper previously filled by them.
Dear comrades, I know that provocations like this have happened to other comrades or their friends everywhere. I think that if we keep silent we end up covering them and, although unintentionally, playing the same game.
In this case, too, ‘the secret is to reveal it’.
Let’s make these episodes known and let’s give all the related details, for example their faces, their accent, their methods, their cars, etc. And don’t forget that while one of them talks to us, others of them are watching us at a distance.
Lets’ look at them and let’s remember their faces. I’m sure that a determined and uncompromising attitude towards them is the best response to their filthy attempts.
They never came back to me.

A FEW COMMUNIQUES ISSUED AFTER THE SEARCHES AND THE ARRESTS ON JULY 27 2004.
SEARCHES AND ARRESTS
An operation led by the R.O.S. along with D.I.G.O.S. has brought about searches in Roma, Turin, Viterbo, Canavese, Genova, Cagliari, Bologna, Cesena, Pisa and Naples this morning. At least this is what is known so far. Four comrades have been arrested: Simone, Sergio, Marco (Tombolino) and Titto. The accusation is conspiracy and attack and refers to the attacks carried out in the past year, from the explosive device outside the Cervantes institute to the mail explosive devices and the attack against the court in Viterbo. We still don’t know where the arrested comrades have been taken. Further updates coming soon.
Solidarity and complicity to the comrades hit by repression.
Fire to prisons.
Anarchist Black Cross
A NEW REPRESSIVE ATTACK AGAINST THE ANARCHIST MOVEMENT
The nth repressive operation on the anarchist movement was carried out at dawn on July 27 2004, following the orders of public prosecutors Vitello and De Falco. One hundred people were searched, 34 of whom are investigated for ‘subversive association, terrorism and subversion of the democratic order’ (art 270 and 270bis), whereas four are in prison on order of preliminary investigation judge Guglielmo Montoni. The searches were carried out in private houses in Rome, Viterbo, Soriano nel Cimino, Latina, Torre del Greco, Canavese, Trentino Alto-Adige and in a few occupied spaces, Ateneo del Dragoncello, Bencivenga 15, Torre Maura in Rome, La Rosalia in Turin, Il Casello and Il Confino Squat in Cesena area. The investigation, aimed at finding the authors of the attacks against the Cervantes institute in Rome (17/06/03), the Via S. Siricio carabinieri station in Rome, where officer Sindona lost two fingers (04/11/03), and the court in Viterbo (17/06/04). The operation, during which huge amounts of documentation and computers were seized, was the fruit of a collaboration between police and carabinieri.
It was the third search here in Torre Maura, where we could see the infamous R.O.S. (who had arrested a few comrades in Trento area last week) coming into the limelight again, after staying in the background since the Marini trial following which 50 people were investigated in 1996 and 6 of them arrested in April this year.
A dozen carabinieri wake us up around 5am after entering the squat with a search warrant. They pay particular attention to our documentation, seized letters and cards (especially correspondence with prisoners) and stay until 9am.
Unlike the raid that took place in February, this time the journalists didn’t pre-announce the arrival of the guards; but once again they stood out in their zealous work of flanking the police.
An enormous new mega-investigation is being carried out, as proved by a number of warrants of investigation handed out over the past few months and by home secretary Pisanu’s declaration. The latter, interviewed by the newspaper ‘La Repubblica’ a couple of days ago, stated that, after successfully defeating the new Brigate Rosse, he was now determined to investigate the anarchist movement. Phone and environmental tapping, which are absolutely irrelevant, are being used to justify the new investigation and to confirm the hypothesis, once put forward by Antonio Marini (today general prosecutor), of the existence of an organisation based on two levels, one public and the other clandestine, so that a great number of people can be accused of subversive association and be arrested. This association would be based on affinity, a concept often expressed by anarchists, as it would imply a voluntary relation of people sharing similar methods and interests. This concept, studied by the investigators, turned out to be unsuited to the current laws. Hence Pisanu’s appeal for a new regulation to be substituted for the old one, which considered armed gangs as having leaders and adepts, whereas anarchist thought refuses hierarchy and authority.
This wide-ranged operation, ‘justified’ by the explosive devices recently sent to a number of targets, actually shows the intent to repress the anarchist movement in all its expressions and, in the last analysis, of annihilating any radical will to social change aiming towards the destruction of power.
…MAY SOLIDARITY GET STRONGER IN ANSWER TO REPRESSION
WITHOUT LEADERS OR LEVELS
NEITHER BAD NOR GOOD…ANARCHISTS!
FREE SERGIO, SIMONE, MARCO AND DAVIDE
FREE EVERYBODY!!!
TORRE MAURA OCCUPATA
Rome, 28/07/04
A VERY IMPORTANT CLARIFICATION ABOUT THE ARREST OF TWO COMRADES IN VITERBO
We heard, and this fills us with great anger, that the evidence against two comrades (Simone and Tittarello) arrested in Viterbo on order of public prosecutor in Rome on July 27 derives from a talk tapped in Angela’s house where Federica and Tittarello were also present.
We STRONGLY DENY that this talk corresponds with what is reported in the arrest warrants and then in the newspapers.
THE TALK REPORTED IN THE PAPERS OF ACCUSATION IS FALSE, MANIPULATED AND PRE-ARRANGED.
We do not intend to back up this operation, not only to defend our friends but also and mainly in the name of our own personal dignity.
Any analysis or report of the event that does not take into account this communiqué will be considered as a personal offence to us and will bring us to take measures.
Angela Mastropierro
Federica Russo
SOLIDARITY TO THE ARRESTED ANARCHISTS
The latest events and what the newspapers have been reporting make us think that a new attack against the movement is underway and that a ferocious wave of repression against anarchists and rebels is in the air.
We express our affection and solidarity to the arrested comrades and with all those who vent their anger and insubordination on the authoritarian system of the capitalist State.
No one can stop the desire for freedom and for subverting the existent.
We invite all rebels to come into play.
Resignation is death!
NO BOSSES, NO JUDGES, NO COPS, FREE EVERYBODY!
FIRE TO PRISONS!
Il Silvestre and the anarchists from via del Cuore - Pisa
July 30 2004
COMMUNIQUE FROM ANARCHIST BLACK CROSS
Two anarchists from Soriano were notified that the investigation against them ordered by preliminary investigation judge Marina Finiti, and which was supposed to finish on October 1 2004, would continue. The notification also concerns a third comrade. The investigation is based on the supposed existence of a subversive association acting in Viterbo, Soriano, Rome and other places from July 17 2003 until now. The three comrades are accused of ‘having manufactured, held and carried explosive devices into Rome on July 17 2004 with aims of terrorism and subversion of the democratic order’. The Cervantes institute in Rome was attacked precisely on July 17 2003, and the action was claimed by the five C (Cells against Capital, Prison, its Jailers and its Cells).
Following the above-mentioned judicial procedure (numb. 27313/03), dozens of comrades are searched on July 27 2004. The cops, in fact, call the operation ‘Cervantes’. After they learned a lesson in the Marini trial, the cops try to demonstrate the existence of a subversive association by simply considering relations founded on friendship and the sharing of ideas and of using everything that happened in Italy over the last two years: the actions claimed by the Anarchist Informal Federation, an attack against a butcher’s shop, mail explosive devices sent to the court in Viterbo, an attack against the CSSA again in Viterbo [the CSSA, an institution created by the ministry of justice, is engaged in the ‘rehabilitation’ of prisoners, translator’s note], mailed explosive devices sent to Rome and Viterbo on November 4, meetings against prison, solidarity events for prisoners, etc. Following a well known practise, cops invade the comrades’ houses and kidnap four of them on orders of preliminary investigation judge Muntoni, which are quite unfounded.
The event of July 27 is part of the turn of the screw that dominion and States are inflicting on those who are against them. We are paying the price for that in Pisa, Arezzo, Viterbo, Rovereto, Rome, Latina, Turin, Lecce, Sardinia and all over the planet. As always, we are accomplices of the guilty and solidly with the innocent. As we are enemies of authority and the State we enjoy each time the latter are attacked with any means chosen. We have always believed that direct confrontation between revolutionary individuals is more valid than any other kind of confrontation, and this is particularly important at a time like the one we are going through. For this reason we propose discussing and evaluating the hypothesis of a national mobilisation (which is necessary in our opinion). We are going to put forward this proposal at the anti-prison camping due to take place in the Latina area at the end of August. Meantime, we will keep on showing unconditional solidarity to all comrades prisoners of the State.
FREE TITTO
FREE SIMONE
FREE TOMBOLINO
FREE SERGIO
FREE ALESSIO
FREE ALL THE COMRADES UNDER HOUSE ARREST
FREE EVERYBODY
Anarchist Black Cross

HOLIDAYS IN ITALY
The so-called Cervantes operation, announced by an investigation begun in 2003 and which aimed at imprisoning dozens of anarchists, comes out of a frame-up orchestrated by public prosecutor (P.ezzo di M.erda) Vitello and carried out by the ROS and the DIGOS. It has brought about arrests and searches all over Italy for one month. [the Italian word for public prosecutor is PM; ‘pezzo di merda’ means ‘piece of shit’, translator’s note].
The accusations are connected to articles 270 and 270bis on subversive association aimed at violently subverting the economic and social order of the State and at committing violent actions (such as acts of sabotage and attacks against property and people) in order to subvert the democratic order. This association would be structured following the subversive scheme of the double level (the one open and apparently legal and the other hidden and practically illegal) and would be based on ‘AFFINITY GROUPS’.
The latter would operate in local areas and would be characterized by maximum knowledge, intimacy and trust between the members. They would also be open to the contributions of anyone sharing their project. Furthermore they would be connected to one another by informal communication and bound together by the project of ‘small actions’ of attack against the institutions, through the practice of armed struggle carried out with simple methods, direct action and the common goal of hitting at the State and the EU. The groups would operate under different names with a unique denomination called Anarchist informal Federation and would be united by mutual support. This support would consist of:
·revolutionary solidarity to arrested comrades or those in hiding;
·participation in a REVOLUTIONARY CAMPAIGN undertaken in an autonomous way by individuals or groups;
·mutual participation in actions of struggle.
The operation, with all these premises and using the bogey of terrorism, shows the State’s plan to destroy and eliminate any critique, solidarity and affinity. Our real concern is not in the operation itself but the popular consensus that it might have. In other words, people might start to think about events and question the credibility of the constituted order. The attack on the anarchist movement, in fact, reflects a politic that aims at destroying any form of expression that does not fit into the social order imposed by capital. This repressive politic is being carried out in Italy but is likely to extend over the rest of Europe. Europol (the European police) is already occupied in looking for possible connections between single groups and individuals that are fighting against the bosses of the world all over Europe. Contacts and affinity between people therefore become alarm bells for the cops, who now want to investigate sociality, which has always been human heritage. Affinity groups become dangerous to public order. What does their use of language signify? Affinity between people has always characterized all relations, including love affairs, friendships and the sharing of common ideas or work (where work doesn’t imply economy but common projects). Language is the object of study for many, but especially for those who want to create a pre-defined model of life through the mass media. Even solidarity as relation between humans becomes dangerous, when it does not imply economic purposes or mere support. In fact, it is made of relations based on sincere feelings that do not fit into the de-humanized social relationships of the capital. Critique, analysis and discussion have always characterized human intelligence: the fact that they come to conclusions against the State is considered subversive. Of course the State prefers to cope with a non-thinking human mass and tries to protect itself from anything that could put its authority and the current political, economic and social order in question. Hence, the State pushes people into not thinking and gives them stupid TV entertainment. Even if the majority don’t express a radical critique of the system, it is clear that discontent is widespread in many fields, and this constitutes a possible danger to it. The latter is by now aware of the fact that people don’t trust the much praised ‘democracy’ any more. The bosses’ thirst for power has dried up the earth and their greed has become visible. Too much offence has been made to those who don’t want to watch politicians consuming all that can be consumed, selling all that can be sold, devastating the entire planet and controlling every single individual everywhere. Not many want to watch the terrorism of the State over entire populations. If as a consequence there’s nothing left but alienation, submission and resignation, then even the most stupid of the stupid realizes that the system he has always believed in is crap. The State must cope with the problem of reconciling its capitalist politics with the reality that it produces, that is to say an increasing number of poor people and the use of more and more security devices. Prisons as containers of anger are multiplying and laws are getting more and more restrictive. The repressive apparatus is therefore getting ready to oppose any possible kind of popular revolt, be it by individuals or animals. We hope the huge bellies of the rich and powerful, greedy and miserable will grow to the point that they collapse into the bowels of the earth. May solidarity and affinity keep on being the pivot of all our relations.
From ‘Rosalia’ and surroundings


UNPLEASANT VISITS
On Tuesday July 27, we are woken up around 5am by six carabinieri, two of them are ROS. Having a warrant of investigation referring to articles 270 and 270bis, they start searching all the rooms of our squat and seize a lot of documentation concerning the struggle against prison and correspondence with prisoners. Furthermore, the pigs take all five of our computers away. They deny, with very trivial and hypocritical explanations, that they can take the hard disk only and they also add that we will be given everything back in six days and in perfect state. According to them, the reason for the search derives from phone tapping that testify that a few people investigated in the operation concerning 34 comrades accused of subversive association were regular visitors to our squat. We are not frightened by this intimidation, which, as usual, aims at dividing and isolating the friends and comrades under investigation; nor are we frightened by the coming back in grand style of the ROS and the theories about double levels. It is just one part of our total refusal of their laws. Solidarity to all those under investigation.
Free Tittarello, Sergio, Tombolino and Simone.
Ateneo occupato Dragoncello

COMMUNIQUE FROM ONE WHO WAS
SEARCHED LAST TUESDAY
Like many other houses searched on Tuesday, following an investigation of anarchist comrades ordered by the public prosecutor in Rome, my house was also visited and devastated for four and a half hours by the ROS, backed by other uniformed puppets of the local carabinieri station.
I won’t indulge in any political considerations about the investigation, which however is likely to be quite a big deal; what I need to do is to send a huge hug to the arrested comrades, who were immediately thrown in the limelight, with name and surnames, by all the national media.
Coming back to the news, on Monday I had discovered a little electronic appliance in my car that consisted of two microphones connected to a mobile phone (that was disassembled) containing a Vodafone-Onmitel chip and another chip for receiving by satellite (GPS). All this stuff was collocated between the internal roof and the external one (as happened to many other comrades in the last month), and was supplied by a connection with the light inside the car. I had been alerted by continuous interference in the radio frequency. The more disturbed frequency was 91 Mhz (FM), maybe ‘Police Headquarters Radio’, or someone broadcasting on their behalf!
On Tuesday morning they searched my house, and my parents were with me. The terror and trembling of my mother at the sight of the bully ROS with his gun on show in his belt, are memories that are very difficult to forget. PIGS!
At the end of the search, during which the co-ordinator (particularly nasty) made me understand that, if I had been alone, he wouldn’t have been so ‘nice’ (!) to me, this material was seized:
-2 computers (a laptop and a home computer)
-2 mobile phones and their chips
-the electronic appliance that I had taken away from my car the day before
-72 recorded CDs (who knows what they will contain!)
-old photos of ten years ago
-documentation about the searches in the site of the Viterbo Committee against repression that occurred in February
-telephone cards, posters and other papers.
In the order the prosecutor addressed to me, and to other comrades, one element is crystal clear: their interest in me derives not so much from the fact that I was searched on other occasions in the past, but from the fact that I am in
touch with comrades in prison or who are under investigation.
All this said, dear comrades, a concept as clear as daylight comes into play, one that a few comrades have sometimes neglected, that is to say: when it is unconditional, SOLIDARITY IS A WEAPON.
The guard dogs of the constituted order and order itself are terrorised by this solidarity because the latter transmits a sense of brotherhood between all the exploited. And capitalist society, through work contracts, social control and various kinds of repression, backed up by the reformist and institutional left, tries with every means to break this solidarity.
I won’t add anything else for the moment.
No regret ever.
A comrade who was searched
ARRESTS AND SEARCHES
CANNOT STOP REVOLUTIONARY SOLIDARITY.
THE REAL TERRORIST IS THE STATE!
Yesterday, 27/07/04, the ROS searched 8 anarchists’ houses in Latina. This repressive operation also extended to other areas and involved a great number of searches, 34 warrants of investigation (270 and 270bis) and four arrests (justified by supposed responsibility in attacks carried out in Rome, Viterbo and Arezzo since 2003). The operation, planned and co-ordinated by the anti-terrorism judges in Rome (public prosecutor Ionta, Vitello and Falco), aims at dismantling what they say is a ‘composite’ organisation created to violently subvert the order of the State.
During the searches, papers, documentation, computers, diaries and phone books were seized and warrants of investigation were notified to everybody.
It is funny that the warrant exposes the formula already adopted by judge Marini against anarchists, that of the double level, the one ‘open and apparently legal’ and the other ‘hidden and practically illegal’.
We claim our struggle, which goes well beyond what is legal and what is illegal. We leave the levels to the repressors and repeat that we are sworn enemies of dominion and its apparatus.
The latest repressive operation, therefore, shows the intent to criminalize anyone who is against dominion and get rid of anyone who represents a threat to the existence of the latter, especially because the struggle for the destruction of all States has nothing to do with democratic-reformist schemes.
We want also to point out that repression has been intensifying in our town over the last period. Judge Ionta, in fact, thinks that certain events that occurred here are related to the anarchist-insurrectionist area, and he is trying to create an atmosphere of alarm with the precious help of the media (for example against the anti-prison camping that will take place on August 20/21/22 in Latina area). Controls against comrades are also intensifying (a couple of weeks ago, for example, a bug was found in the home of an anarchist from Latina).
Free Sergio, Simone, Davide and Marco.
Solidarity to the investigated
A few anarchists from Latina.

FREE DAVID, MARCO, SERGIO
AND SIMONE
On Tuesday morning four arrests and a number of searches were carried out in Viterbo and all over Italy. The reasons are the need of power to find those responsible for the acts of social insurgency that have occurred lately, its attempt to present this insurgency as a simple criminal matter, the urgency of completing a judicial procedure opened one year ago.
The accusations are based on false evidence, such as carefully manipulated bugging, proving the attack against the court in Viterbo and letters of one of the arrested that had already been seen by the censors in the prison. It would be ridiculous if it wasn’t that our friends and comrades are in prison.
All the arrested were charged with article 270 and 270bis, which is openly ideological and represents the main instrument used by repression to maintain this rotten social order.
We refuse to accept that cops and judges have a right over our lives, not even that of judging us following their infamous codes.
There are no guilty or innocent for us, a distinction good only for those who follow the ‘values’ of capitalist dominion, but only comrades in prison whom we love and respect in spite of possible differences, and we want them to be free.
FREE EVERYBODY!
FIRE TO PRISON AND TO THE JAILERS!
Anarchists from Viterbo
Committee against prison and social repression in Viterbo.

SEARCHES IN VITERBO AND IN
MANY OTHER TOWNS
The houses of a few comrades of the Committee in Viterbo and of other anarchist comrades were searched this morning around 5am.
There have also been a few arrests.
The operation, carried out by the Digos and the ROS on order of judge Vitello, refers to the infamous articles 270 and 270bis (subversive association aiming at violently subverting the economic and social order of the State). It is the same investigation that brought about searches in the houses of many comrades, including those searched today, on February 17.
It is the nth persecutory act of the State and its servants the judges, who hope to scare us in this way.
But they are wrong: we will carry on our struggle against repression and filthy institutions.
Free everybody!
Fire to prison!
EVERYBODY IN JAIL
(WHO CONSTRUCTED THE FRAME-UP?)
Dozens of people were woken up at five am all over Italy by armed bullies dressed in black. Like many other friends of ours, we also received the unexpected visit. Luckily the cops reassured us and told us that we would only be inflicted a search because ‘we are dangerous terrorists and part of a ferocious subversive organisation..’. One never stops learning in this life!
Of course the heroes didn’t find anything interesting. As they were not happy to go back home empty handed (especially considering the time they had had to get up), they decided to take a computer (the only one in the house) and left with a paradoxical ‘have a good day’!
TV news and newspapers grasped the occasion and made a quiz show: the winner was the one who told the biggest lie. ‘Il Resto del Carlino’ won first prize, with its title: ‘They were even ready to kill’, which made us burst out laughing. But there’s nothing funny actually.
The accusation, which also brought about the arrests of four young comrades, is that of ‘subversive association’, the infamous article 270bis, which home secretary Pisanu is distributing as if it were sweets for children. This article can lead to up to 15 years’ imprisonment and was introduced into the penal code as an ‘exceptional law’ during the fascist period (Rocco code). It does not hit at any real ‘crime’ (associations committing subversive acts) but it creates a crime of ideas (‘associations that possibly plan to commit subversive acts’, as stated in the text of the article). It is the ‘intention’, and therefore the ‘idea’, of putting the State’s authority into discussion that is punished; but, unless the ingenious repressive machinery has a crystal ball, it will have to INVENT the possible instigators. So, given that anarchists are a thorn in the side of the system but are always there, why shouldn’t the system use article 270 to get rid of them? After all, as the government’s main feature is social control, it certainly can’t tolerate the fact that there still exist people who want to decide for their own life and live as free people, what an absurd idea! This is the reason why these people, following a law that calls to mind some South American dictatorship, turn out to be dangerous terrorists. And, as evidence does not have to demonstrate the execution of a ‘crime’ but the ‘association’ among people who ‘plan’ to commit it, then a normal telephone call to a friend is more than sufficient to confirm the accusation.
This frame-up is not the first nor is the last as article 270bis is the strongest weapon that the Italian State has ever found to silence any dissident voice. So who are the real terrorists? They are judges willing to climb the social ladder, employed by a government that wants all of us to be silent automaton in a world that is already a prison, inside as well as outside it.
We hope our jailers will suffocate in their own lust for power. We are going to live our life beyond the misery they want to impose on us. We will enjoy life and all that it has in store for us.
To all victims of repression, to Sergio, David, Marco and Simone.
CASELLO SQUAT
AL CONFINO SQUAT
Food not bombs Romagna
Equal rights Forli’
Filini Team
(Anarchist Black Cross)