After years of trial and numerous postponements of the hearings, it came the first instance conviction against the FIDAL doctors and one employee , accused of having favored with their omissions the doping of Alex Schwazer in 2012. Severe penalties, greater than the prosecutor’s requests: 2 years for Pierluigi Fiorella and Giuseppe Fischetto (with annexed 2 years of interdiction from the medical profession), 9 months for Rita Bottiglieri (she whom the prosecutor had requested to absolve due to insufficient evidence), and for all perpetual interdiction from federal sports assignments. Now we wait,the motivations (it will take 90 days) and the second degree of judgment.
The judgment of the Court of Bolzano is in any case opposed to what the Italian sports institutions had already decided on two separate occasions:
- 5 October 2015, request for reduction of doping disqualification by Schwazer, rejected by the National Anti-Doping Court.
On this occasion the words of the Anti-Doping Prosecutor were emblematic because with regard to the revelations of Schwazer, underlined how “both the Prosecutor’s Office of Bolzano and the Anti-Doping Prosecutor’s Office believe that the Athlete has not fully told the whole truth and that there remain strong gray areas on which the Athlete, although repeatedly requested, has not rendered the right and necessary clarifications ” and that ” the Athlete had not provided any new evidentiary element with respect to the information dated 30 July 2014. On the contrary, we believe that dr. Fiorella and the dr. Fischetto have answered the questions put by providing objective evidence“ - 7 December 2017, proceedings against Giuseppe Fischetto and Pierluigi Fiorella by the Italian Sports Medical Federation, acquittal of the tribunal.
In this process he was always a prosecutor, that of the sports medical federation Mr. Cesare Martellino (former Chief Prosecutor of Terni and first president of the Football Federation Appeals Committee), to be perplexed by reading the documents of the Bolzano criminal trial, so to say “But where is the violation of the rules? I ask for absolution”
Of course, ordinary justice moves on a different level from sports justice, but in fact here there is an overlap, a dangerous short-circuit. Schwazer witness, that was considered unbelievable in 2015 (by both the attorney, ordinary and sports) becomes credible given today’s sentence, who was acquitted at the end of 2017, for the same facts is condemned today. In detail, Rita Bottiglieri having no accusation with sport justice, and Bolzano prosecutor requesting her acquittal, but she is condemned by the judge. So how does it work? Who is right?
Before answering, let’s try to reflect on it; in all this time both Sandro Donati and the journalists of his side, pushed on an alleged plot against Schwazer by citing inconsistencies, suspicions, conflicts of interest, and also highlighting the relationships between people, obviously including the accused doctors in this process. We can try to analyze the question from another point of view, but based on three facts.
Fact 1: in March 2016 the Italian parliamentarian Riccardo Fraccaro reported publicly, after also a parliamentary question, that among the members of the Foundation Sparkasse savings bank, were among the others Gerhard Brandstätter (Schwazer lawyer and President of the Bolzano Savings Bank), Guido Rispoli (former head prosecutor of Bolzano, who started and followed the investigation, leaving then in the hands of Giancarlo Bramante who is the current prosecutor) and Carla Scheidle (the judge who issued today’s sentence). Riccardo Fraccaro stated that “The list is long and is the result of the current system of co-optation, which has in fact created an elite, a good living room where South Tyrol’s high society finds itself and decides … Judges and investigators are often willingly linked equivocal with that finance and the political one that should instead control“.
Fact 2: Sandro Donati said to be a WADA consultant (and this is written on the cover of his second book), but WADA disprove it on March 2016: “he did not hold any appointment, and he is not our consultant“. So, it’s not known in what capacity, Sandro Donati has actively collaborated in the investigations of the Bolzano Prosecutor’s Office, and he has seen many documents (fact that he confirmed to me). After the investigation he took under his “wing” Alex Schwazer, with the condition that he would tell the whole truth about doping. The charges of Schwazer against the doctors (born more from a simple rereading of documents of the investigations than from his spontaneous revelations) then they arrived at the attourney after the plea bargain, but they were not considered relevant by sporting justice, consequently the athlete for the first disqualification did not get penalty reductions. The South Tyrolean admitted in court that he was helped in the drafting of these confessions by Sandro Donati. Finally, it is found in the Italian newspapers that the first contact between Schwazer and Donati was already in early 2013, with the South Tyrolean investigated while the coach collaborated in the investigation.
Fact 3: for the Schwazer doping affair of 2012, the doctor Michele Ferrari was not accused and not called to testify, despite according to the investigative documents the athlete had with him a doubtful collaboration relationship, kept secret by also sending emails under the false name of Alfred Rainer. It is clear from one of the emails contained in the investigations documents, sending the values of a Schwazer blood test in May 2010; on this, Prof. Sottas (WADA official) stated that these values were compatible with blood doping. To date, however, the sports results of Alex Schwazer in 2010 have never been canceled and a sporting process has never been opened.
So let’s go back to the question: who is right, ordinary or sports justice? The Italian journalist Eugenio Capodacqua replied, providing his redundant version, once again talking about self-referential sports organizations and therefore, according to him, not credible. Is reasonable to think of it, but if you look carefully, Sandro Donati compared to Eugenio Capodacqua is self-referential, and the same can applies to other journalists who are his friends. And the question of other self-referencing might also arise.
The conclusion is that anyway, just or not, the judicial case of Fischetto, Fiorella and Bottiglieri, is already in use, abuse and consumption of the “fans” of the plot against Schwazer, that in addition to overturning the sporting ethics with outputs and disparate statements (the case studies on the group “I’m with Alex” or on twitter is devastating due to ignorance and involuntary comedy), they feed on false news that then regurgitate around.
The sentences must be respected, both those sporting and penal; but first of all it is the truth that must be respected. So waiting for the future results and the long-awaited DNA, you just have to do a bit of Fact Checking, so much material was there before, but after today there will be at will.
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FACT CHECKING January 25, 2016
From the Facebook page “I’m with Alex – Io sto con Alex”: “Alex Schwazer deposed in court against the two doctors mentioned on December 16, 2015. That day the IAAF program the notorious doping control of January 1, 2016”. Fake thesis, in fact, those who support it, omits to say that in reality Schwazer had already deposed on 23 November 2015 against Fischetto and Fiorella, and that the “accusations” against the doctors were already known from April 2015, when his confessions to the various prosecutors ended without too much difficulty in the hands of the newspapers.
Sandro Donati, thanks to the pen of Eugenio Capodacqua (article here >) storm still on the sports world and not with various statements. What better day of today to make a strike.
Donati 1: “I remember that was I who told Wada, on 11 and 12 July 2012, about the need for a doping control for Alex”.
will also be true that he wrote to WADA, but the same World Anti-Doping Agency together with CIO and the IAAF (yes, the same IAAF of Fischetto), had already decided a month before his “indications” to check Schwazer three times at the end of July 2012 because there were already evidence of blood doping, fact confirmed in court by Prof. Sottas (WADA official). Donati therefore has no merit, but continues to repeat this story as if it were the opposite.
Donati 2: “Now this sentence also highlights the responsibilities of the environment and makes it clear from a very clear perspective the presumed second positivity of Schwazer found on 1 January 2016”
Other speculation. Based on which evidence or circumstances can be said that today’s decision, even before was pronounced, led two years ago to the phantom (and alleged) plot of January 1, 2016? Remaining the fact that the plot against Schwazer is like the Yeti; many speak about it, but no one has evidence of his existence.
Donati 3: “There has always been hostility towards Schwazer to whom the National Anti-Doping Court has never given the possibility, for the alleged second doping case, of a sports hearing in Italy”
Here he even attacks the National Anti-Doping Court, omitting the evidence that can be easily found by reading the various National Anti-Doping Court and TAS-CAS press releases;between June and July 2016 was Schwazer with his legal staff to insist on a suspension of the precautionary suspension, which by regulation only the Lausanne TAS could grant. Then the Swiss Court rejected the request, but proposed to Schwazer to decide in the merit in order to satisfy his haste (if he had gone to trial through the National Anti-Doping Court, all of it would be discussed in September after the Olympics, as happened to the other Italian banned Jamel Chatbi). In the end, Schwazer accepted by consciously choosing to skip the Italian judgment, so Donati what he wanted more, ad hoc rules only for his athlete?
22 december 2017 su AtleticaLive (gossip web site on side of Donati), and here only the title is enough
Donati 4: Sandro Donati to AtleticaLive: “The media favored the cover-up of the Schwazer case”
Issue of numbers (source Datastampa) which once again disprove the coach. In the year 2017, Schwazer was quoted in Italian newspapers 940 times, specifically Schwazer + DNA 137 times, Schwazer + plot 149 times; on average, the “sacred urine” has been spoken in the newspapers certainly 11 times a month, and it is not a little. Then if we add the articles on the websites and the many hosted on television, who still has the courage to say that the media have not given space to the question? For comparison Antonella Palmisano is an amateur, only thanks to the London medal was quoted in the newspapers 214 times, otherwise she would have remained in oblivion. And then Donati when calls everyone’s answer, let’s not get around; at the time it also had TV2000 (officiale TV of the Italian Episcopal Conference) available, that hosted he many times without a cross-examination.