The Supreme Court of Cassation VI Criminal Section with the judgment 18257/2015 has sanctioned, confirming the view put forward by lawyer Giovanni Di Cagno, partner of Polis Avvocati, for the first time in the court of legitimacy, the principle according to which the institution of the interruption of the statute of limitations of the administrative offense, attributable to an entity pursuant to Legislative Decree 231/2001, is governed by the rules proper to the Civil Code.

The act interrupting the statute of limitations, therefore, must be served on the defendant entity and not merely filed with the clerk’s office in order to unfold its effects.

“The ruling appears particularly noteworthy,” commented Lawyer Di Cagno, “because it has dealt a powerful blow to the widespread, as well as inaccurate vulgate, according to which problems related to the administrative liability of legal persons for crime, the ascertainment of which takes place in the criminal trial, should be addressed exclusively with the tools and categories proper to criminal law and procedure.

Instead, the subject matter requires a multidisciplinary approach and integrated criminal, civil and administrative law skills, without which the interpreter risks losing the thread of the complex architecture intended by the legislature.”