Highway Code

Unauthorised speed cameras, the municipality also risks aggravated conviction

While the MIT announces that the corrective is ready, the Justice of the Peace of Sanremo punishes the police force's insistence with additional disbursements

by Silvio Scotti

4 February 2026

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2' min read

Translated by AI

Versione italiana

2' min read

Translated by AI

Versione italiana

The affair of the lack of homologation of speed cameras is perhaps being resolved: on 31 January the MIT announced that it had forwarded the 'corrective' DM to the Higher Council of Public Works (for its opinion) and to the MIM (for notification to the EU). But the same MIT estimates that, out of the approximately 11 thousand devices present in Italy, only a little over a thousand are automatically in compliance with the new Dm. And the police forces that employ all the others are risking a lot: in addition to having their reports cancelled, they could be condemned for reckless litigation, as happened on 12 January to the Municipality of Ventimiglia (Imperia).

The Instrument

In fact, the Justice of the Peace of Sanremo recognised in the Municipality's insistence on the validity of the report the requirements of reckless resistance ("aggravated liability", pursuant to Article 96, paragraphs 3 and 4 of the Code of Civil Procedure). The rule provides that the judge, even without a specific request by a party, may condemn the losing party to pay an equitably determined sum to the prevailing party and from EUR 500 to EUR 5,000 to the Fine Fund (also to defuse the inappropriate use of the procedural instrument).

In this case, the judge applied the legal minimum, also because it is the first judgement with such consequences.

The motivations

The judgment, although an unprecedented application of Article 96 of the Code of Procedure, is in line with the pronouncements of the Supreme Court. In fact, the lack of approval (which cannot be replaced by approval as was the case until now) determines the nullity of the minutes. And the Court has recently begun to adopt the accelerated decision (with an invitation to withdraw manifestly unfounded appeals), provided for by Article 380-bis of the same Code in the case of questions already largely resolved from the point of view of legitimacy.

This is precisely why the judge in San Remo decided to apply the aggravated sentence.

Of particular interest to the jurist is the full-bodied, precise and convincing motivation given by the magistrate in accepting the requests of the lawyer Marco Mazzola, who defended the alleged offender: 'Ministerial approval authorises the serial reproduction of a device tested in a laboratory, while approval consists of a procedure that does not require comparison of the prototype with characteristics considered fundamental or with particular prescriptions'.

The judgment then retraced the interpretations of the Supreme Court. But it did not neglect to cite the arguments of the Ministry of the Interior, which conversely insists on the substantial identity between authorisation and approval.

Additional risks for municipalities

It is now a question of understanding the scenarios that lie ahead. Now other judges of merit could follow the one in Sanremo. And the outlay of public money that a conviction for reckless litigation entails may also pave the way for convictions by the Court of Auditors against the public officials who cause it (fiscal damage).