The family is highly favored by right-wing groups, especially during election campaigns. So the government Melon has the intention to investigate the case of 3 children who were removed from their parents and home Palmarosi Forestprovince of Chieti, in Abruzzo. The story of mother and father – Anglo-American Nathan and Catherine – seeking a life surrounded by nature far from the city, has divided Italy and shaken politics. Justice Minister Carlo Nordio announced an “in-depth analysis”, following a conversation with Meloni without excluding a hearing in Court. Also Matteo Salvini he spoke out against the judge’s decision, expressing his intention to meet his mother and father. For the minister, this was a “kidnapping” of children. Strong criticism of the Court’s decision also came from the National Association for the Protection of Children’s Rights and the Child Rights Observatory. Meanwhile online petitions in support of parents are spreading.
Nordio: “Removing a child from the family is a very painful act”
“Any procedural considerations are premature, we will definitely carry out an in-depth investigation,” said the Justice Minister Carlo Nordioin an interview with Tg1 director Gian Marco Chiocci. “We need to see whether “living in a state of nature” harms children’s education or not, but I think parents are the first to realize their duty”, continued the Seal Keeper. “Removing a child from a family is a very painful action, so it needs to be studied further,” concluded the Minister of Finance.
Yesterday the prime minister Giorgia Meloni has evaluated the possibility of a ministerial examination at the L’Aquila Juvenile Court, in conversation with the Minister of Justice. Last Thursday, a judge ordered the removal of the three children from their Anglo-Australian parents, Nathan and Catherine, to a protected home.
For Matteo Salvinithe verdict was “the kidnapping of three children taken from a mother and father in an inappropriate, alarming, dangerous and shameful manner. I am committed to solving this and if necessary also speak with a juvenile court judge.” The minister wanted to meet with parents, but also fueled propaganda in his favor justice reform: “I will go to Abruzzo next week. Judges and social workers in Abruzzo do not bother us – he added -. This story also shows that a deep, healthy and fair but unsuccessful judicial reform would be fundamental”.
The National Association of Judges (Anm) calls for caution and respect for judges. The decision “was based on a technical evaluation and objective elements: safety, health conditions, access to sociality, compulsory education. And the decision was taken in accordance with current regulations and with the aim of exclusive protection”, the cape said. Yang rejected the parties’ propaganda to the sender: “In our opinion, the exploitation of certain policies seems to be in sharp contrast to respect for the rights of minors.”
The father: “Nothing will stop us from living in nature”
The children’s father defended himself, claiming his life choices and attacking the judge’s decision, in an interview with Repubblica. “I’m not crazy, I speak five languages and I have lived in six countries. In Europe and Asia. I have studied and understood what is the best way to be happy. I have decided, together with my wife, to live in nature, nothing can stop us”, says Nathan Trevallion. He said he met his wife Catherine in Bali, Indonesia: “We were looking for a new life. She came from a rich family, a Catholic strong. He is a riding instructor and has written a training book with a foreword by the Queen of Denmark. Catherine speaks six languages. We believe, Catherine and I, in a life without contamination, concrete and spiritual. A friend of my wife had spoken to her about Abruzzo as a special and still sacred land.”
Meanwhile, mayor Palmoli in Chieti province has announced the next steps the children should take. “They will carry out a series of activities and health visits to pediatricians, vaccination checks, interviews psychological “which until now has not been possible,” said the Mayor Giuseppe Masciulli. “His parents cannot do some activities – added Masciulli – as also confirmed by Nathan (the father, ed) who recently, in a provocative way, openly stated that he wanted to ask for 50 thousand euros for each child to undergo a medical examination”. The father went to the facility yesterday morning to bring fruit and clothes for the family, remaining with them until the afternoon. The people of the small village of Palmoli, with a population of more than 800 people, followed the story of the family in the forest with bated breath and were very close to them”, concluded the Mayor.
Online petition challenges the Court’s decision
A new online petition has been launched in the last few hours to support the family. The first appeal on November 11, “Let’s save families in the forest”, surpassed 78 thousand signatures, with a spike of around 23 thousand signatures in the last 12 hours. At least seven other petitions were started after the court decision: among them, “Free the children of the family in the jungle”, “For the children in the jungle to appeal to the L’Aquila court to reunite the family”, and “Close to Nathan and Catherine, the family living in the jungle”. Other appeals gathered hundreds of signatures calling for reunification or condemning the dismissals as unfair: “Let’s protect happy families” has received 5,055 signatures since November 2.
Child Rights Observatory: “Changing the law, not separating careers”
The Child Rights Observatory also strongly criticized the Court’s decision. “The most adversely affected by this problem are the institutions, from which public opinion is oriented to increasingly distance itself from it,” said sociologist Antonio Marziale, president of the Observatory.
“If judges have applied the law rigidly, then the law should be changed immediately, and this is not the first sign that there is a need to review the office that handles the removal of children from families,” Marziale said. He is a member of the National Observatory of the Presidential Family of the Council of Ministers, resurrected together with Meloni in the Palazzo Chigi thanks to the ministerial decree of 11 May 2023. Since 2016 he has been Guarantor of Children and Youth of the Region of Calabria. In the capital he is a contract professor of sociology at the University of Mediterranean Studies. Marziale urged “the Government and Parliament” to give “priority to judicial reforms that are not limited to the separation of careers, but are oriented towards protecting the rights of citizens, especially if they are minors”.
Marziale does not believe that removing the children is a necessary action for judges to apply the law: “However, if minimum flexibility is within their prerogative, we need to understand the reasons why they did not take that into account.” The expert underlines a decisive aspect in children’s education: “If the decision is determined (…) by the failure to attend the classroom, it is necessary to remind those who hold decision-making power that parental educational institutions exist, the implementation of which is less traumatic than its abolition. From another point of view, this terrible event marks the breakdown of the institutional system”.
For the president of the Observatory, “separation from parents has reason to occur in many other situations, such as when children are at risk of personal safety, due to mentally disturbed parents, which, unfortunately often happens, go so far as to kill them, even though the responsible institutions have decided that there will be no risk”. “Expulsion – the sociologist concludes – should be a last resort, but in this extreme case we can only and exclusively recognize the fruitlessness of the legislative and judicial systems.”
National Association for the Protection of Children’s Rights: “Abolition of minors? A 2 billion business”
In an open letter addressed to Matteo Salvini, President Antonio Borromeo condemned the system’s distortions. The first is the economic interest associated with the transfer of minors: “a gain of around two billion euros for the community, plus another billion for psychological and psychiatric consultations”, says Borromeo. According to the National Association for the Protection of Children’s Rights, more than 32 thousand minors are removed each year due to alleged parental unsuitability, often based on “subjective assessments or formulated by operators still in training”. President Borromeo called on the Northern League leader “not to limit himself to media initiatives”, such as requests for meetings with parents, but to use the role of government to initiate organic reforms in the system. “We need urgent legislative intervention,” Borromeo warned.
