An Italian court has convicted 15 Italian officials of abusing protesters held in at police garrison following violent demonstrations during a Group of Eight summit in Genoa seven years ago.
Judges in the northern Italian port handed down sentences ranging from a few months to five years in jail for the officials, who included government doctors, police officers and corrections officers, said a lawyer for some of the alleged victims.
Attorney Alfredo Galasso, who represented two Italians held at the garrison, said the judges cleared 30 other officials on charges of assault and abuse of authority.
Alessandro Vaccaro, a lawyer for Antonio Biagio Gugliotta, a corrections inspector who received the longest sentence, insisted his client was innocent and would appeal the verdict.
Mr Vaccaro said Gugliotta and the others convicted were unlikely to go to jail because the statute of limitation on their alleged crimes expires early next year, long before appeals would be completed. Defendants in Italy usually do not go to jail until they have exhausted appeals.
The G8 summit in Genoa saw riots by anti-globalisation activists that left one protester dead, more than 200 people injured, 240 detained and millions of dollars in damages.
Last year, a Genoa court convicted 24 protesters on charges of devastation and looting, giving them sentences ranging from five months to 11 years in jail.
But much of the outcry in Italy and abroad that followed the summit focused on the police's handling of rioters.
Protesters from Italy, as well as Britain, France, Germany and other countries, said they were beaten by police, strip-searched, and denied food, phone calls or access to consulates while detained in the Bolzaneto police garrison.
In a separate case, 29 police officers are on trial on charges of inflicting violence and abuse of office during a pre-dawn raid on a school where activists were staying during the summit.
AP