Intrigue at Italy’s Palace of Justice?1
A shocking exposé screened by Italy’s public broadcaster: RAI on the evening of Sunday January 4, 2026 refocused national attention on a scandal which had been festering for decades: the failure of the Italian authorities to hold to account people responsible for a national epidemic of avoidable ill-health and premature deaths.
In this sorry saga one name stands out above all others: Stephan Schmidheiny. Schmidheiny – referred to as STS in confidential emails disclosed during the latest episode of the flagship investigative program Report2 – is the former CEO of the Swiss Eternit Group, an asbestos conglomerate with worldwide holdings. Despite guilty verdicts in multiple Italian jurisdictions, 78-year old Schmidheiny remains free to live a life fit for a billionaire. Since the Italian litigation began, it’s believed that the beleaguered entrepreneur and “environmental philanthropist” has remained holed up at his home in Hurden, Switzerland despite allegedly owning properties in Chile, Argentina, Costa Rica and the US.3
 This exhibition was on display outside the Turin Criminal Court on February 13, 2012. The English translation of the caption under the images of Stephan Schmidheiny is: “Mr Stephan Schmidheiny you belong in jail.” Picture from the IBAS archive. |
Before continuing I should point out that although I watched the 42-minute program, it is in Italian, a language which I do not speak. By using an online application, I was able to translate the 20-page transcript of the January 4th episode of Sigfrido Ranucci’s award-winning series into English.4 I will accept that there are nuances that will have escaped me but I believe that using that text as my primary source and various online articles as well as the contents of emails from Italian colleagues I correctly understood the revelations about the use of opaque and questionable extra-judicial strategies made by TEAM Schmidheiny to manipulate the Italian judicial system
The “international intrigue” revealed during the program did not surprise me. After all, I had spent many weeks in 2011 reading through files which had been confiscated by Italian police at the Milan office of the public relations company hired by Schmidheiny called: GCI Chiappe Bellodi Associates.5 I was well-versed in the contents of the Bellodi PR “Bible,” the first commandment of which was, and I am paraphrasing here:
“Thou shall not take the name of Stephan Schmidheiny, your paymaster-benefactor, in vain, nor should it be openly spoken or recorded in any written, oral or electronic format.”
The disclosures which caused the most heartache amongst the Italian communities still mourning their asbestos-dead and looking after their asbestos-injured were related to emails exchanged by members of the industrialist’s legal defense team and international power-brokers who were, so they claimed, in position to:
- “influence the outcome of one of the most high-profile mega-trials of the last twenty years, the one concerning the Eternit environmental disaster;”
- “establish a discreet lobbying effort in Rome;”
- mount an international lobbying campaign and engage with “social circles” in Rome;
- prepare a “possible escape” route should the 2014 Supreme Court verdict go against the defendant.6
Commenting on this program, the President of the Associazione Familiari Vittime Amianto [Association of Relatives of Asbestos Victims] (AFeVA) Giuliana Busto – whose 33-year-old brother Piercarlo Busto died of the asbestos cancer mesothelioma in 19887 – said:
“The Report investigation we just saw only confirmed the suspicion we had from the very beginning regarding the Supreme Court’s ruling, even though we were afraid to voice it... We are shocked by this investigation because, once again, the victims and the suffering of an entire community are being overtaken by the interests and profit of those who demonstrate their desire to prioritize profit and their own well-being at the expense of so many human lives. These are not tragic events, but actual murders, ruthlessly plotted and carried out with the complicity of those who had the opportunity to deny the evidence. How many more times will we have to suffer these abuses.”8
The media coverage of the explosive disclosures made during the Report transmission was rather muted. This was particularly surprising due to the national prominence given to the initial trials against Schmidheiny. I was in courtroom 2 at the Turin Criminal Court to hear the verdict delivered on February 12, 2012; courtroom 1 was full to capacity with asbestos victims, relatives, campaigners and representatives from more than a dozen Italian municipalities contaminated by the operations of Eternit asbestos-cement factories. Crowds of TV reporters and film crews were crammed together towards the back of the courtroom.
 Courtroom 1 at the Turin Criminal Court February 12, 2012. Picture from the IBAS Archive. |
It was estimated that there were 1,500 people present to hear the ruling that day. Details of the judgment, descriptions of the proceedings and photos from the courthouse were reported on TV and dozens of newspapers not only in Italy but throughout Europe: the fact that a foreign entrepreneur could be convicted for deadly decisions made and actions taken in Italy was indeed important news.
The news of the guilty verdicts handed down by the Turin judges for Stephan Schmidheiny and Jean-Louis de Cartier de Marchienne were on the front pages of many Italian newspapers. As I was returning to the UK from Turin the next day, I remember buying every newspaper on sale at the airport and tearing out the pages mentioning the trial. I had a very large stack of newsprint to fit into my luggage!9
The case deserved all the attention it got and more. Referred to as “the people’s trial,” 10 and the Great Asbestos Trial, it was “the largest and most complex asbestos case ever heard in a European criminal court.”
“The Turin proceedings are ‘great’ in all senses of the word, in the: number of aggrieved parties, legal representatives, municipalities, issues, and worksites involved; prolonged duration of the trial; fundamental legal concepts explored; decade of painstaking and meticulous research required to bring the defendants to court; expectations of the bereaved that the verdict will recognize the cataclysmic nature of the crimes committed.11
 Stylized image of the Casale Monferrato Eternit asbestos plant in the 1920s. Thousands of deaths in Casale Monferrato were caused by exposures to asbestos liberated by the operations of Stephan Schmidheiny’s factory. Picture courtesy of AFeVA. |
There is no proof that the offers made by international powerbrokers revealed on the Report program were either realized or responsible for the Supreme Court’s contentious decision to overturn Schmidheiny’s previous convictions on the grounds that the charges of causing permanent environmental disaster had been statute barred.12 The Italian public most definitely is entitled to know why the Supreme Court took this action. “It is right to demand that everything be clarified,” said Laura D’Amico, a lawyer who represented AFeVA and local trade union branches during the original Turin trial. “It is a legal and moral duty because this affair reopens wounds for thousands of people.”13 Of course, she is right.
After the devastation caused by the unexpected judicial reversal in 2014, public prosecutors quickly regrouped and brought other proceedings against Schmidheiny and more convictions followed. Holding their collective breath, asbestos victims’ groups in Italy, their leaders and members as well as their lawyers and public prosecutors await the Supreme Court’s decision in an appeal against guilty verdicts delivered by the Novara Court of Assizes (2023) and the Turin Court of Appeal (2025). From what I understand, if a decision is not made by June 7, 2026, the case will, once again, be barred by the statute of limitations.14
In light of the recent revelations featured in the TV exposé, the judges might do well to consider taking timely and appropriate action. Stephan Schmidheiny has sworn that he has “no intention of seeing an Italian prison from the inside.”15 Surely that’s a decision which should be made in Italy and not Switzerland. The world is watching!
January 13, 2026
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1 The home of Italy’s Supreme Court – Corte Suprema di Cassazione (Court of Cassation) – is the Palazzo di Giustizia (Palace of Justice), Rome, Italy.
I would like to acknowledge assistance gratefully received with the writing of this article from: Silvana Mossano, Victoria Franzinetti, Giuliana Busto, and Drs. Daniela Degiovanni & Federica Grosso.
2 RAI REPORT. L’offerta del diavolo [The Devil’s Offer]. January 4, 2026.
https://www.rai.it/programmi/report/inchieste/Lofferta-del-diavolo---Report-04012026-a7ec0497-731b-47ec-83a5-6672b3a29f31.html
3 Kazan-Allen, L. Introduction. Asbestos & The Great Asbestos Trial. 2012.
https://www.ibasecretariat.org/eternit-great-asbestos-trial-introduction.pdf
Serafin, T. The Bill Gates Of Switzerland. October 5, 2009.
https://www.forbes.com/forbes/2009/1005/creative-giving-philanthrophy-bill-gates-of-switzerland.html
4 Sceneggiatura del programma L’offerta del diavolo [Transcript of the Program The Devil’s Offer]. January 4, 2026.
https://www.rai.it/dl/doc/1767709638028_LOFFERTA%20DEL%20DIAVOLO%20di%20Sacha%20Biazzo.pdf
5 Kazan-Allen, L. Eternit vs. The Victims. Chapter 11 in Asbestos & The Great Asbestos Trial. 2012.
https://www.ibasecretariat.org/eternit-great-asbestos-trial-chap-11.pdf
6 The case being litigated at that time was the appeal by the legal team of Stephan Schmidheiny against an 18-year prison sentence for negligence and wilful disaster which had been confirmed in 2013 by the Turin Appeal Court.
Asbestos Profile: Italy. Accessed January 11, 2026.
https://www.ibasecretariat.org/prof_italy.php
7 Francia, M. Ucciso in cinque mesi. Faceva footing vicino agli stabilimenti Eternit [Killed within five months. He was jogging near the Eternit factories.] July 20, 2010.
https://www.ilmonferrato.it/articolo/KykpgH-wUkmMJU31V6etuQ/ucciso-in-cinque-mesi-faceva-footing-vicino-agli-stabilimenti-eternit
8 Email received from AFeVA President Giuliana Busto on January 8, 2026.
AFeVA is the asbestos victims’ group representing many victims and family members from the town of Casale Monferrato, considered to be the epicenter of Italy’s asbestos scandal.
9 Kazan-Allen, L. Landmark Victory for Italian Asbestos Victims. February 18, 2012.
https://ibasecretariat.org/lka-landmark-victory-italian-asbestos-victims.php
Kazan-Allen, L. Great Asbestos Trial: Post-Verdict Developments. July 17, 2012.
https://ibasecretariat.org/lka-great-asbestos-trial-post-verdict-developments.php
10 In an interview published on January 5, 2026, Laura D’Amico, a lawyer who represented AFeVA and local trade union branches during “the people’s trial” said the case was “one of the most important of her career.”
Palazzo. C. L’avvocata D’Amico: “Costernata sulle rivelazioni Eternit-Epstein ma serve prudenza” [Attorney D’Amico: “Dismayed by the Eternit-Epstein revelations, but caution is needed.”] January 5, 2026.
https://torino.repubblica.it/cronaca/2026/01/05/news/avvocata_d_amico_eternit_-epstein_intervista-425076064/
11 Kazan-Allen, L. Introduction. Asbestos & The Great Asbestos Trial. 2012.
https://www.ibasecretariat.org/eternit-great-asbestos-trial-introduction.pdf
12 Jean-Louis de Cartier de Marchienne died aged 91 on May 21, 2013 as a result of which the charges against him were struck off by the Appeal Court on June 3, 2013. Not only did the Appeal Court confirm the lower’s court’s guilty verdict for Schmidheiny but it upped his prison sentence from 16 to 18 years. On November 14, 2014, however, the Supreme Court reversed the rulings of both courts on technical grounds.
Kazan-Allen, L. Postscript to the Great Asbestos Trial. January 14, 2015.
https://ibasecretariat.org/lka-postscript-to-great-asbestos-trial.php
13 Palazzo. C. L’avvocata D’Amico: “Costernata sulle rivelazioni Eternit-Epstein ma serve prudenza” [Attorney D’Amico: “Dismayed by the Eternit-Epstein revelations, but caution is needed”]. January 5, 2026.
https://torino.repubblica.it/cronaca/2026/01/05/news/avvocata_d_amico_eternit_-epstein_intervista-425076064/
14 Kazan-Allen, L. Asbestos Crime and Punishment in Italy 2025. April 25, 2025.
https://www.ibasecretariat.org/lka-asbestos-crime-and-punishment-in-italy-2025.php
15 Pegoraro, A. Mr Eternit ora insulta l’Italia: "Un Paese fallito, io vi odio" [Mr. Eternit now insults Italy: “A failed country, I hate you”]. January 24, 2020.
https://www.ilgiornale.it/news/cronache/processo-eternit-bis-schmidheiny-provo-odio-italiani-1816184.html
