Cassation

There was a criminal conspiracy in the Juve Curve

Filed the grounds of the verdict that, for the first time in Italy, ascertained criminal ramifications in organised cheering

by Patrizia Maciocchi

26 September 2025

JUVENTUS PALESTRA SQUADRA CALCISTICA CALCIO JUVE

4' min read

Key points

The co-existence of licit and illicit activities
The story reconstruction
An encore trial

4' min read

A criminal association in the Juventus ultrà group, aimed at obtaining invincing profits. The Court of Cassation deposited the motivations with which, on 19 March, ruling on a trial held by the Court of Appeal of Turin, recognised, for the first time in Italy, the crime of association to commit crime applied to organised fan events.

In the judges' sights had ended up the pressions that during the 2018/19 football season the curve would have exerted on the Juventus, orchestrating, for example, a fan strike or the launching of chants 'connotated by evident discriminatory and racist content', in order not to lose certain privileges. The Supreme Court emphasised that 'it is therefore, configurable the crime of association when the members of an organisation formally intended for lawful purposes carry out unlawful activities, provided that it is proven, as in the case at hand, the existence of a functional link between such conduct and the general directives coming from the top of the organisation itself'.

The co-existence of licit and illicit activities

According to the Supreme Court, 'the judges of merit correctly remarked how the leaders of the Ultra Drughi group deliberately flanked the lawful activity with an unspecified unlawful activity aimed at obtaining huge profits, by leveraging the pre-existing organisational structure, as well as the human and material resources of the ultra group, in a context of planned and conscious instrumentalisation of the ultra group forcriminal purposes'.

The reconstruction of the story

The Court of Cassation reconstructed the complex events that led to the contested ruling, starting from 2016. Year in which there was a significant change in the relations between thefootball club Juventus and the ultrà groups, following the investigation conducted by the Anti-Mafia District Directorate of Turin, called "Alto Piemonte" and the consequent sanctions imposed on Juventus by the Federazione Italiana Giuoco Calcio for the facts that emerged in the context of the aforesaid investigative activity.

Until then, Juventus F.C. had adopted a consolidated practice consisting in the systematic sale of a large number of tickets to ultra groups, as an exception to the ordinary distribution channels. In particular, for each sports match, 25 tickets were made available free of charge for each club, destined for the so-called 'bannerists', in charge of displaying the identification banners of the respective group inside the sports facility. Further quantities of tickets were supplied directly to the ultras by the club, outside the official ticketing circuits.

A practice in contrast with the legal and regulatory provisions on the sale of admission tickets to sporting events, justified by the company with the need to prevent hostile behaviour or potential harm to the corporate image and public order. The judgments of merit - recalls the Supreme Court - had, as early as 2019, highlighted how subjects linked to mafia-type organised crime ('ndrangheta) had taken advantage of the anomalous practice to enter the lucrative bagarinaggio circuit.

Following the 'Alto Piemonte' investigation, the club gradually changed its attitude towards the fringes of organised supporters. There was a steady backtracking on benefits, continuing however - for the 2017/2018 season - to guarantee a quota of tickets reserved for ultrà groups for away matches and those played abroad, with the system of so-called 'lists'. This was until 17 April 2018, when the Questore of Turin ordered the Juventus' Admiral, 'the immediate cessation of the practice of assigning free tickets to bannerists of ultrà groups, deemed not to be in compliance with the regulations in force on access tickets to sporting events'. The club, fearing the protests of the ultras and the consequent possible repercussions on public order, had asked for and obtained a postponement in the implementation of the measure, which was postponed to the following season.

But Juventus' new line has triggered reactions from the ultras, made of pressures on the club to re-establish the old treatment. "In particular, in the days immediately preceding the start of the season ticket campaign for the 2018/2019 football season, numerous banners were put up in various parts of the city, with strongly denigrating and defamatory content towards the company and the Agnelli family, clearly traceable - on the basis of intercepted conversations - to the deliberate initiative of the ultrà groups following the refusal of the requests made to the Juventus management. Contextually - the judges write - the same groups communicated the will to desert the official presentation of the player Cristiano Ronaldo and to refrain from attending certain events and sporting meetings considered of particular importance for the image of the club'. Actions that are not only symbolic, but which have translated into a 'fan strike'. A protest that was carried out 'continuously throughout the entire 2018/2019 football season, with rare exceptions, and was implemented in such a way as to coercively extend to the rest of the fans present at the stadium. In some cases, such organised silence was interrupted by chants connoted by evident offensiveness and discriminatory and racist content".

According to the Supreme Court, the District Court inferred "the existence of the criminal association aimed at committing an indefinite number of extortions and private violence (number of participants, division of roles and responsibilities, full awareness) - we read in the judgement - of the reciprocal causal contribution to the realisation of the associative aims, interaction of the conduct put in place by the defendants, indefiniteness of the criminal programme protracted over time and aimed at forcing the company Juventus to bend to the multiple requests made by the ultra groups'.

An encore trial

There will, however, be a bis trial for three of the five defendants (one of whom is Geraldo Mocciola, indicated as the leader of the group) because the Court of Cassation found a defect in the motivation of the appeal sentence for only one charge: the alleged extortion carried out by the Drughi to obtain 25 season tickets in favour of the bannerists.