Security Decree and the Prison System
May 19th, 2025
In the article “Security Decree and the Prison System”, published in Sistema Penale, Francesco Palazzo analyzes the new security decree (Decree-Law of April 11, 2025, No. 48), focusing on the amendments affecting the prison system.
In particular, the author highlights, on one hand, the measures specifically targeting prison labor, aimed at promoting its use also extra moenia, and at defining a set of fundamental principles for labor intra moenia; on the other hand, he reviews the changes that more indirectly affect the system, consisting of provisions designed to ensure greater security within prisons, including the introduction of a new aggravating circumstance and a new criminal offense.
As emerges from the full article, in the author’s view, these are largely ineffective solutions: in the first case, because they amount to mere formal implementations—either left to private initiative or limited to general statements of principle; in the second, because once again, the legislator opts for a repressive rather than a preventive approach.