Document Oct. 26, 1996

Condemned for possession of Word
In occasion of 2nd PEACELINK”™s National Convention – Statte (TA),held on 26-27 October 1996 we said, in our intervention (italian only), that:

“ [“¦] Censorships, repressions, bureaucratic monkey wrenches”¦ With the excuse of protecting us, they”™re trying to put reins on us. There are many interests, either public or private, political and administrative or economical, that want to reprime our freedom and take hold of our world to subjugate it to their rules.

Without much imagination”™s effort, here and today at this big party, the witness of our shattered illusion. Giovanni Pugliesà©s witness must not be forgotten and continue to be part of the experiences of everyone of us. For this reason, but also to give our acknowledgement to the long personal involvement, well known to all attendees, ALCEI makes a very very small concrete action by announcing you that Giovanni Pugliese is now a honorary member of our association.”

Unfortunately, the recent events have confirmed our fears and, as a gesture of solidarity, we broadcast the following PeaceLink”™s communiquà©:

CHARGED AND CONDAMNED: THEY NEVER COMMITTED THE CRIME. WHAT”™S NEW?

The court of Taranto condamned Giovanni Pugliese, secretary of Peacelink Association, to three months”™ imprisonment. He also has to pay 500.000 Italian Lira and the cost of the trial. In addition to it he must pay 3.625.000 Italian Lira and the expert report (unbilievable, it costed 9.530.000). The charge: Pugliese held and copied pc programs for commercial reasons. And who is the one who should pay for it? Giovanni Pugliese, a simple worker employed in Agip, someone who could loose his job because of the crisis of the Company in the area of Taranto.

THE EXPERT REPORT

The result of the report made by the expert (we have many douts about his expertise) on the pc that Giovanni Pugliese had at home was the following: he had a program (Word) but he didn”™t have the license for using it. The program was part of a BBS (a data bank) used by Pugliese who couldn”™t spread it in the network.

The Italian law makes a distinction between the duplication of a program for personal use and the duplication of a program for commercial use.

This a story characterised by a political meaning given to an expert report. There is no evidence of any “crime” committed by Pugliese. There is nothing proving that he either transmitted copies of the above indicated program through his modem or he made copies of it for commercial reasons.

La legge italiana distingue la duplicazione di programmi a fini personali dalla duplicazione abusiva a fini di lucro; se cosଠnon fosse la maggioranza degli utenti di computer dovrebbe andare in galera.

Believe it or not Giovanni Pugliese didn”™t have the opportunity to defend himself in court because he was never called by the judge!!!

Giovanni Pugliese as well as his lawyer got to know about the sentence 10 days after it was passed. They didn”™t know anything about it!!!

EVERYTHING STARTED ON JUNE 3, 1994
when the data bank of Peacelink was seized by the Guardia di Finanza (the Italian Custom). Pugliese never got to know who and how this nightmare started.

Who is Giovanni Pugliese? Everybody has Giovanni in high esteem, he is a generous and unselfish person, who worked for free in Peacelink. He created one of the bigger telematic network existing in Italy: PeaceLink.

Someone is trying to shut the mouth of Pugliese as well as Peacelink.The main goal was to stop Peacelink.

The GUARDIA DI FINANZA (Custom) in TARANTO

The Guardia di Finanza di Taranto was unable to make a connection via modem to the BBS of Giovanni Pugliese. They believed Giovanni Pugliese charged 50.000 to 200.000 for the connection used to commercialize – illegally – a certain number of programs. But everybody knows that the connections were made for free.. The Guardia di Finanza couldn”™t discovery because they didn”™t have e modem.

Pugliese live in a small rental house and in his bank account there isn”™t the big amount of money he should have meade “selling” unauthorized copies of the Word.

Where did the Guardia di Finanza collected the information regarding Pugliese? Nobody knows.

THE ROLE PLAYED BY THE SECRET SERVICES

PeaceLink has been under control since a long time. Our activity was considered as a “danger” and the Italian intelligence service had to control us! What a shame, they could have been used to help protecting the judges Falcone and Borsellino killed by the “mafia”.

PeaceLink, anyhow, didn”™t fall down after the confiscation of its data bank. The result was much stronger: we used our free voice to help people such Gianmarco Coniglio (who was terribly sick) and the street children of Koinonia in Nairobi (Kenya).

WHAT WAS THE “DANGEROUS” ACTION OF PEACELINK?

The recent history of our activity has been published in two books:

– Telematica per la pace (ed.Apogeo)
– Oltre Internet (ed.EMI)

And we, the authors, donated all the royalties to the street children of nairobi.

The one who are trying to hit PeaceLink are attacking the Italian Freedom of expression through the net.

Whoever feels like sending a message of support to us, to face this shameful sentence of the Italian Court, can write to: Giovanni Pugliese [1]

But if there is any one who knew that Giovanni Pugliese was selling unauthorised copies of programs through the data bank of PeaceLink “¦. well, we invite you to tell it to the Guardia di Finanza (the custom) of Taranto.

Alessandro Marescotti spokesman of the Association “PeaceLink”