Court Hearing for Alessia Pifferi: Psychiatric Evaluation Reveals No Major Disorders

In view of the hearing on March 4, which promises to be tense, complete with a strike outside the courtroom by Milanese lawyers in support of the lawyer under investigation in a parallel inquiry, on the case of Alessia Pifferi, after weeks of controversy, an important procedural fact arrives. The 38-year-old was capable of understanding and wanting, 'lucid' when she abandoned her daughter Diana, less than a year and a half old, alone in the house for six days, leaving her to die of hunger and thirst. After four months of work, forensic psychiatrist Elvezio Pirfo, appointed by the Milan Court of Assizes presided over by Ilio Mannucci, has filed the results of the expert opinion: absence of 'major psychiatric disorders', nor 'serious personality disorders'. Alessia Pifferi, trial in tilt: the pm leaves, accusation split on the investigation on the psychologists. The investigations: No mental defect for the defendant, accused of voluntary aggravated murder also by premeditation and who at this point risks life imprisonment, even if the judges could recognize extenuating circumstances and, hypothetically, the sentence could decrease. 'With this expertise it is certain life imprisonment, but I trust in the Court of Assizes. I believe that the climate is now vitiated by the fact that the pm has investigated me and the psychologists, which has intimidated everyone', argued lawyer Alessia Pontenani, referring to the dossier opened during the trial by pm Francesco De Tommasi. The tests: In his almost 130 pages Pirfo writes that in the absence of video-audio recordings of the interviews with the psychologists 'it is not possible to give a complete evaluation about the possible induction or suggestion of the defendant'. However, the expert puts in black and white that that test carried out by the two professionals is not 'entirely in accordance with the reference protocols and good practices' and 'the outcome' cannot be considered 'reliable and compatible with the mental and personality characteristics of the defendant'. The interrogations: In the interrogations and in the expert opinion interviews, however, she has always shown 'a 'resistance to fatigue', a 'resilience, a capacity that is to withstand adverse events, higher than what can be expected in a person marked by a complex and in some ways unhappy existence'. All accompanied by 'precision of answers and integrity of memory'. The problem, she said in the interviews with the expert, 'is that my mind has turned off, it has really detached from the role of mom (...) today I feel like a bad mother'. And to the lawyer she reiterated: 'I'm not a murderer'. While her sister Viviana, civil party with lawyer Emanuele De Mitri, explains that the expert opinion 'confirms that Alessia has never had any mental disorder', the lawyers remain on a war footing. The Order of lawyers has asked the prosecutor Marcello Viola to intervene to 'safeguard the effectiveness of the right of defense'. Viola is about to deliver a report requested on the case - which saw the other pm, Rosaria Stagnaro, leave the trial - by the attorney general Francesca Nanni.