Subversive association for the head of the Italian neo-Nazi cell

The rules onterrorism are extensible tothe leadership of neo-Nazi associations that have racial hatred and theorisethe use of violence on a scale that harms entire communities.

The Court of Cassation (judgement 36665/2025) deposited the grounds with which, on 24 September, it had given the go-ahead for the tightening of the precautionary measure requested by the Naples Public Prosecutor's Office against Maurizio Ammendola, the alleged leader of the"New Order of Hagal", sentenced at first instance last December to five years and six months, ordering a change from house arrest to prison, for the crime of subversive criminal association, under Article 270 of the Penal Code.

The accusation is that he is the promoter and organiser of the cell of the neo-Nazi and supremacist organisation 'Order of Hagal' capable of proselytising in Campania. For the judges a hierarchical organisation with followers bound by a secret vote and trained militarily to 'be ready to use weapons against civilian targets in secret and against the Carabinieri barracks in Marigliano'.

The Supreme Court endorses the extension of the considerations on the subject of terrorism, with regard to the inappropriateness of house arrest, in the case of membership of a conspiracy aimed at subverting the established order.

The appellant, through social media, incited racial (Article 604-bis of the Criminal Code) and ethnic hatred, to commit acts of discrimination and violence also based on minimisation and apology of the Shoah. The rule on subversive association - the legitimacy judges point out - has many affinities with the characteristics of the neo-Nazi cell 'whose programme expresses a conception of the world based on violence, discrimination,' reads the judgment, 'on the exaltation of a race and on the affirmation of a category of people considered superior to others'.