Published on 20 October 2025
FIRST SECTION
Application no. 63726/10
Angela NARDULLI
against Italy
lodged on 26 July 2010
communicated on 29 September 2025
SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE
The application concerns the confiscation of the applicant’s property as a preventive measure.
The applicant’s husband, E.Z., was subjected to several criminal proceedings for participation in a mafia-type organisation, drug trafficking, and extorsion. In the light of the statements made by his co-accused (who had outlined E.Z.’s involvement in the activities of a criminal organisation), he was declared socially dangerous in accordance with Article 1 of Law no. 575 of 1965 and was consequently placed under special police supervision as a preventive measure. On the same grounds, on 25 February 2005 the District Court ordered, inter alia, as a preventive measure, the confiscation of an apartment formally owned by the applicant, which it considered to be actually at E.Z.’s disposal.
The confiscation rested on the presumption of its unlawful origin owing to the discrepancy between the apartment’s value and the applicant’s lawful income, together with her inability to demonstrate the property’s lawful provenance. While E.Z.’s pre-trial detention for his alleged participation in a mafia-type organisation was quashed due to the lack of converging suspects, the confiscation order was upheld on 14 March 2006 by the Court of Appeal and on 18 January 2007 by the Court of Cassation. It thus became final.
E.Z. was later acquitted of all charges in the criminal proceedings. Relying on this circumstance, the applicant requested that the confiscation of the apartment be revoked.
The District Court rejected the request on the basis of the autonomy between criminal proceedings and proceedings for the imposition of preventive measures and on the significant discrepancies between the applicant’s income and the value of her property. The decision was upheld first by the Court of Appeal and on 5 Mach 2010 by the Court of Cassation.
Relying on Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 to the Convention, the applicant complains of a disproportionate interference with her property rights.
QUESTIONS TO THE PARTIES
Was the interference with the applicant’s peaceful enjoyment of possessions in accordance with the requirements of Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 to the Convention? In particular, was the interference necessary and proportionate to the aims pursued for the purposes of Article 1 of Protocol No. 1?
The parties are invited to address the following points:
a) whether, in light of E.Z.’s acquittal of all the charges against him, the domestic courts’ refusal to lift the confiscation was justified;
b) whether the domestic authorities showed that the confiscated asset could have been of wrongful origin in a reasoned manner, on the basis of an objective assessment of the factual evidence, and without relying on a mere suspicion (see Todorov and Others v. Bulgaria, nos. 50705/11 and 6 others, § 215, 13 July 2021; compare Silickienė v. Lithuania, no. 20496/02, § 68, 10 April 2012, and Veits v. Estonia, no. 12951/11, § 74, 15 January 2015).