Decision of the Court of Cassation, II Civil Section, No. 3656 of 24 February 2016

The Court of Cassation held that the principles established by the European Court of Human Rights in the case Grande Stevens and others v. Italy (judgment of 4 March 2014), in which the Court stated that the pecuniary sanctions provided for by Article 187 of the Consolidated Law on Finance were essentially “criminal”, were not applicable to the administrative fines imposed by the Bank of Italy pursuant to Article 144 of the Consolidated Law on Banking. Considering that these sanctions have no criminal nature, the Court of Cassation clarified that there was no question of compatibility of the sanctioning procedure envisaged in this matter with the guarantees that Article 6 of the ECHR prescribes for criminal proceedings.