November 30 1979, ended, in the appeal court of Catania, the trial against comrade Bonanno, accused of ‘instigation to commit a crime’ and ‘apology of crime’ for having written the book ARMED JOY.
The sentence was twice that requested by the Attorney General (9 months) taking it to one year and six months. It should be pointed out that comrade Bonanno was acquitted in first grade even for lack of proof.
The very serious significance of this sentence should be seen in the intention of power to restrict any space of dissent, even that which manifests itself through the publications of the revolutionary movement, with the aim of having a free hand to instore their own repressive project without failure and without making too much noise.

In order for the design of the reaction to be realised it is necessary to ‘terrorise’ those who are working in the field of counter-information, facing them with the alternative of putting an end to it, or going to prison for years.
If one looks at the ‘technical’ way in which this was done by the judiciary of Catania, one cannot fail to be struck by the effrontery and the cultural squalor that the four judges called upon to decide upon a fact that – at least formally – depicted the ‘cultural crime’ managed to show. This is not of secondary importance in that it gives us the measure of how safe power feels, now that it is perfecting its repressive agreement with the parties of the left and with the unions, and, feeling sure of itself, of how it intends to proceed.
No dignity of analysis, no pseudo-scientific pudor. The Attorney General, in his intervention in the trial, revealed such ignorance, obtusity and lack of preparation as to cause the public to laugh. Dr Bisaccia let himself go in a rant about anarchy that would have made even the most unprepared schoolboy in the room blush, passed sentence with the knowing remark that ‘society is the State’, gave us a humouristic description of the ‘birth of society according to capital’, let a tear drop for the poor carabinieri killed (forgetting the thousands of workers that die every year at their place of work), clearly gave the impression of not even having skimmed through the book (object of the accusations) drawing conclusions that were absolutely untenable.
Iezzi was at the height of his worthy gaffer, preventing the comrade Bonanno from speaking, after the interventions of the lawyers and the above-mentioned Bisaccia. Evidently words scare these signori, who while of words they define themselves competent to judge (nothing else was mentioned in the trial).
The other two mummies present in the quality of judges didn’t open their mouths, evidently lost in the digestive difficulties of their late brains.
Why this pantomime? Why this time did they not consider it opportune to give to the spectacle that the court paints itself with, that minimum of cultural decorum that so clearly appeared in the first trial? Perhaps the appeal judges (older and more seasoned) are all idiots and more ignorant than those of the first grade?
Frankly, we consider that this way of carrying out the trial, the arrogant ignorance and the satisfied stubborness of the Attorney General, the deaf will to strike and the fearful intention not to listen to the other judges makes sense: that power chose its worst and least qualified of its own representatives in order to hit harder. In fact, it is well known that the clumsy hangman is the worst executioner.