The assistant prosecutor general
(PG) at Italy's supreme Court of Cassation said Friday that an
"emotional storm" can be a legitimate extenuating circumstance
when considering a sentence reduction in a murder case.
The court rejected an appeal by Bologna prosecutors against a
ruling by an appeal court to almost halve the sentence of a man
for the homicide of his partner on the grounds that he was in
the grip of an "emotional storm" when he killed the woman.
The appeal court had reduced the jail term of Michele
Castaldo, who confessed to killing Olga Matei, a woman with whom
he had been in a relationship for about one month, from 30 to 16
years, provoking widespread condemnation.
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