ITALY: Due Process

Eight months ago (TIME, Nov. 16) onetime Socialist deputy Tito Zaniboni was pounced upon by Roman policemen as he peeped through the telescopic sights of a rifle. For hours thousands of Fascists howled for Zaniboni’s blood. Then Signor Mussolini—well knowing that the rifle had been trained upon a balcony of the Palazzo Chigi whence he had been scheduled to speak—stepped dramatically upon that balcony and cried: “Fascists, No Revenge! You will obey! You will take no revenge upon Zaniboni, because I wish it!”

Thus tenderly preserved by Il Duce from Latin lynching, Zaniboni had escaped extra-legal retribution up to last week, when General Prosecutor Crisafulli of Rome announced that he will be tried shortly, charged with “attempting a premeditated homicide upon Premier Mussolini which was averted by circumstances beyond the accused’s control.”

Four* of Zaniboni’s alleged accomplices will be tried on an elaborate charge; “Complicity in an attempted premeditated homicide; conspiracy to foment civil war and revolution, and a violent change in the government and its form; the carrying out of secret and seditious propaganda; and the collection and administration of funds for these several purposes.”

*General Capello, Ulisse Ducci Ferucco and Nicolozo Luigi Calligaro are in jail. Angelo Ursella has yet to be nabbed. Eight others, arrested as accomplices, were released last week.