Augusta Zuncheddu's appeal for a civilisation law: Beniamino has lost everything, sign the popular initiative proposal

"I ask you to take action to get people to sign the popular initiative bill that provides for a cheque for all victims of miscarriages of justice and unjust imprisonment awaiting a sentence for damages. Like my brother Beniamino there are thousands of citizens who, after being released from prison and losing everything, have been abandoned by the state. Forced to go to Caritas and not knowing how to live. This is not right. It is not human. A law of civilisation is needed'. This is the appeal launched by Augusta Zuncheddu, sister of Beniamino, the Sardinian shepherd who spent almost 33 years in prison without fault. The woman, who has always supported Beniamino in the legal battle to prove his innocence, invites people to sign the popular initiative bill 'Beniamino Zuncheddu and others'.

Today, after an acquittal at the end of a review process or release for wrongful imprisonment, the victim is left completely alone, without resources with which to support himself while waiting for compensation that sometimes takes up to ten years to arrive. 'The state threw him out of prison with a bag of clothes and nothing else. Beniamino is a man who has lost everything: he has considerable health problems, he couldn't have a family, he doesn't have a job, he won't have a pension because he has been in prison as an innocent man for almost 33 years,' says Augusta, reached by telephone at his home in Burcei.

A whole life, that of Beniamino, spent behind bars without being able to build a family, without being able to have a job, without being able to have a livelihood today. An odyssey reconstructed in Innocent, the podcast produced by Sole 24 Ore and Radio 24 that recounts the ordeal of the Sardinian farmer, accused of triple murder and attempted murder. A massacre that dates back to 8 January 1991, which took place in the mountains of Sinnai. Lies, deception, false testimony and recantations polluted the evidence and the sole survivor of the massacre pointed the finger at Beniamino. Too bad the testimony was false, induced by a Criminalpol agent. The acquittal verdict of the revision trial proved the falsity of the charges for which Beniamino had been sentenced to life imprisonment as an innocent man.

Beniamino entered prison two months before his 27th birthday and left at the age of 59 with the release order issued by the Rome Court of Criminal Appeals on 25 November 2023. And he became a free man again on the day of his acquittal, 26 January 2024. Free, but without any livelihood. "This law is important for the many Beniamino's who find themselves living as innocent, life-shattering judicial vicissitudes. People forced to turn to Caritas in order to survive. People already humiliated by the State who also find themselves having to lose their dignity,' recalls Irene Testa, the Sardinian Garante dei detenuti and treasurer of the Radical Party who has done so much for Beniamino's release.

"Beniamino's life was seized, everything was taken from him. Yet we have paid all the legal and judicial costs over these decades, only to see the institutions turn away. What happened to Beniamino can happen to anyone,' Augusta recalls in her appeal in which she asks journalists, mayors, councillors of all regions to sign the Zuncheddu popular initiative bill, to compensate those who have been unjustly condemned and then acquitted following a review process or for those who have been victims of unjust imprisonment. Augusta recalls that you can sign online using Spid, Cie or Cns, but that there are also paper forms available to municipalities that will request them to allow citizens who wish to do so to sign the proposal. 50,000 signatures are needed.