Italy’s government has moved quickly to answer two days of violent unrest in Milan, approving an emergency decree that gives police and prosecutors expanded powers to pursue rioters — including juveniles — and puts parents on the hook for damage their children cause, according to reporting by Breitbart News.
Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni announced the package Tuesday after an emergency meeting of the Council of Ministers in Rome. The decree, which she described as a “decree on juvenile security and crime,” will take effect immediately rather than waiting for the longer legislative process her government had already been preparing, Italian public wire service ANSA reported.
The escalation followed a weekend of chaos in the northern city. Roughly 200 police officers were injured in clashes with so-called cost-of-living protesters, more than 270 people were detained — 220 of them minors, many from migrant communities — and authorities reported looting, arson and attacks on law enforcement in central Milan.
What the decree does
At the center of the package is a newly created crime of “violent participation in a protest.” Under its terms, anyone who joins a demonstration of more than five people in which stones, firecrackers, sticks or similar implements are used to endanger others faces up to five years in prison and a fine of up to 20,000 euros, or roughly $22,500. Penalties rise further if a participant wears a mask or face covering, injures someone, or causes destruction.
Meloni framed the measures as a matter of basic accountability. “We have all seen the images of the violence that shocked Milan and other Italian cities over the weekend: shops looted, windows smashed, and law enforcement officers attacked,” she said. “These are unacceptable scenes that no one can even think of minimising or justifying, which is why today the Council of Ministers approved a decree with new measures to prevent and combat this violence.”
The decree also includes what Meloni called a vandals-pay clause, built on what she described as a “simple principle”: “whoever breaks the law pays, and if the person breaking the law is a minor, their parents pay.”
She laid out how the mechanism would work in practice. When public property — a bus shelter, a traffic light, a van — is damaged, the prefect sends a payment order to the owner. When the damage hits a private individual, such as a smashed shop window or a damaged car, the owner can go to a judge and obtain an immediately enforceable injunction.
Justice minister: minors over 14 presumed to understand consequences
Speaking from Palazzo Chigi, Justice Minister Carlo Nordio said the decree is meant “to stem this phenomenon that has affected our cities in recent days.” Among its provisions, the justice system will presume that minors over the age of 14 have the “capacity to understand and decide” whether to take part in public violence and rioting — a shift that makes it easier to prosecute them.
Nordio added that the decree creates another new offense: using a computer or other electronic device to promote the formation of a violent demonstration. That carries a penalty of between four and 12 years in prison.
Beyond the legal changes, the government approved deploying 500 soldiers to Milan to support local police in preventing further disorder.
Separately on Tuesday, 11 minors were placed under house arrest for alleged involvement in the riots, looting and destruction.
Salvini welcomes the crackdown — and pushes for more
Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini, leader of the populist League party, welcomed the criminal code changes in characteristic fashion. “He who errs pays. Because he who smashes a shop window or assaults a sales clerk is not a revolutionary: he’s a fucking idiot,” he said, as quoted by Breitbart.
Salvini said his party will push for further legislation to strengthen the state, including measures that would allow the government to strip citizenship or residence permits from migrants who commit crimes, and to bar minors from receiving Italian citizenship if they deal drugs, loot or vandalise.
The unrest has revived a familiar debate in Italian politics over juvenile crime, immigration and public order, and Meloni’s coalition is treating the weekend’s events as a test of whether the state can respond with speed. The decree’s use of emergency powers sidesteps the slower parliamentary route, though such measures typically require later confirmation by lawmakers.
For now, the government’s message is that the response will be both judicial and financial: new crimes on the books, lower barriers to prosecuting teenagers, and a bill sent to whoever — or whichever parent — is deemed responsible for the damage.
Source: www.breitbart.com — https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2026/10/20/you-break-it-you-pay-meloni-announces-emergency-legislation-against-multicultural-youth-riots/