Don't Punish The Hungry For Stealing A Bit Of Food: Italian Court

Stealing food is not a crime if you are hungry and desperate enough, rules Italy's highest court.

It follows a controversial case that happened in 2011, when Roman Ostriakov, a homeless 30-year-old Ukranian national, tried to rob sausage and cheese worth $4.50 from a supermarket. He had the money only for breadsticks.

Another customer at the store saw him and sneaked about him to the security. Four years later, he was convicted and sentenced to six months with a $115 fine.

The media and public heard about it. Most of the people saw a parallel with the story of Jean Valjean, the protagonist of Victor Hugo's "Les Misérables", in which he was caught stealing bread for his sister's starving children.

The state prosecutor argued that he should be found guilty not of theft, but attempted theft. He had been caught before he left the store, so he needed to be absolved of the technicality.

Surprisingly, Italy's Supreme Court of Cassation completely threw out the conviction, as, in its eyes, stealing some small quantities of food by a starving man is not a crime.

"The condition of the defendant and the circumstances in which the seizure of merchandise took place prove that he took possession of that small amount of food in the face of an immediate and essential need for nourishment, acting therefore in a state of necessity," the court said  in a written ruling.

The media hailed the ruling as a humanitarian act of mercy.

"The court's decision reminds us all that in a civilized country no one should be allowed to die of hunger," the Italian newspaper La Stampa wrote in a front-page editorial.

Still, many slammed the Italian justice system for taking five years to settle a case about a theft that was worth less than $5.

"Yes, you read that right," an opinion column in Corriere della Sera said, "in a country with a burden of €60bn in corruption per year, it took three degrees of proceedings to determine 'this was not a crime."