The Court of cassation has ruled for the first time since the relevant decisions of 20 March 2018 of the European Court of Justice (Menci, Garlsson Real Estate and o., Di Puma and Zecca cases) in the matter of ne bis in idem with reference to the administrative and criminal proceedings.

The Court correctly affirmed that the judges of legitimacy can assess the proportionality of the duplication of penalties, provided that no new factual assessments are needed, using the criteria provided for by section 133 of the criminal code. This judgment is in line with the recent European case-law which has significantly scaled the scope of the ne bis in idem principle.

Criminal law and Process n.12/2018