Article 41-bis prison regime

In Italian law, Article 41-bis of the Prison Administration Act, also known as carcere duro ("hard prison regime"), is a provision that allows the Minister of Justice or the Minister of the Interior to suspend certain prison regulations and impose practically a complete isolation upon a prisoner. It is used against people imprisoned for particular crimes, such as Mafia-type association under 416-bis (Associazione di tipo mafioso), drug trafficking, homicide, aggravated robbery and extortion, kidnapping, terrorism, and attempting to subvert the constitutional system.^[1] It is suspended only when a prisoner co-operates with the authorities, when a court annuls it, or when a prisoner dies.

The Surveillance Court of Rome is the court competent on nationwide level on appeals against the 41-bis decree.^[2] The European Court of Human Rights found in 2007 that the regime breached two articles of the European Convention on Human Rights. Earlier in 2002, 300 Mafia prisoners declared a hunger strike. In 2022, Alfredo Cospito, an Italian anarchist, began a hunger strike, which generated mainstream media attention on the 41-bis.

^ Long Distance Proceedings Through Videoconference: The Italian Experience Archived June 11, 2007, at the Wayback Machine, Ministry of Justice (Italy) at the Tenth United Nations Congress on the Prevention of Crime and the Treatment of Offenders, Vienna, April 10–11, 2000
^ "Response of the Italian Government to the report of the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (CPT) on its visit to Italy". European Committee for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment. Council of Europe. 20 April 2010. Retrieved 18 August 2011. The responsibility to decide on complaints against the ministerial decree setting the 41bis regime has been given to the Supervisory Court in Rome, in order to avoid conflicting verdicts on this issue by the territorial Supervisory Courts being in the past entrusted to decide, depending on the territorial penitentiary at which the prisoner under 41 bis had been placed; the term to lodge a complaint has been extended from ten to twenty days, though such complaint does not suspend the execution of the relevant measure.

[uncjin-1] Long Distance Proceedings Through Videoconference: The Italian Experience Archived June 11, 2007, at the Wayback Machine, Ministry of Justice (Italy) at the Tenth United Nations Congress on the Prevention of Crime and the Treatment of Offenders, Vienna, April 10–11, 2000

[2] "Response of the Italian Government to the report of the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (CPT) on its visit to Italy". European Committee for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment. Council of Europe. 20 April 2010. Retrieved 18 August 2011. The responsibility to decide on complaints against the ministerial decree setting the 41bis regime has been given to the Supervisory Court in Rome, in order to avoid conflicting verdicts on this issue by the territorial Supervisory Courts being in the past entrusted to decide, depending on the territorial penitentiary at which the prisoner under 41 bis had been placed; the term to lodge a complaint has been extended from ten to twenty days, though such complaint does not suspend the execution of the relevant measure.

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