Instructional goals
Knowledge of criminal liability arising from the violation of workplace safety provisions, with specific regard to the different liability of individuals and corporations.
Prerequisites
Knowledge of the institutions of the so-called general part of criminal law and the general theory of the crime.
Intended learning outcomes
Knowledge and understanding: the student – through class participation and activities organized during the course – will have acquired full knowledge of: the workplace risk assessment system; general protective measures; best practices for compliance activities’ management within corporations; the punitive measures provided for individuals and corporations in case of violations of workplace safety provisions; the main principles of criminal law (causal nexus and negligence in particular) that have been shaped in the context of the duty of care. At the end of the course, this knowledge will be verified with an oral exam.
Applying knowledge and understanding: The comprehensive knowledge and theoretical-practical tools acquired during the course will make the student able to interpret and identify, also with regard to concrete cases, the criminal liability profiles arising from failure to comply with the discipline on workplace safety, taking into account both individuals and corporations. At the end of the course, this knowledge will be verified through a final oral exam.
Making judgement: The student, through participation in the course activities, will be able to collect data and materials to analyse the relevant legal framework as well as the jurisprudential and doctrinal approaches linked to the issue of criminal liability related to the violation of workplace safety discipline and the connected compliance activities. The student, therefore, will have acquired – also through participation to workshops – the ability to evaluate such data and materials independently and to formulate his or her own critical judgement on the application of the legal discipline and the inherent principles to practical cases, identifying concrete solutions to the problems that are submitted to him or her.
Communication skills: at the end of the course the student will be able to use the legal and technical vocabulary of the subject, using it with adequate terminological precision. Through the various training activities that will take place during the course – case solving with classroom discussion, workshops, communication exercises on the basis of the presentation of a project – the student will be able to put these communication skills into practice in different contexts, thus acquiring the ability to adapt the terms used to the context and to the interlocutor of the single case.
Learning skills: the knowledge acquired during the course will allow the student to understand and interpret independently the legislative variations and the new doctrinal and jurisprudential approaches that will characterize the subject of labour criminal law. In addition, through participation in the various activities of the course, students will acquire the basic knowledge to continue their professional specialization in the field of legal advice on criminal compliance related to the discipline of workplace safety.
Course Contents
The work-linked risk protection system and the key figures of the system;
the delegation of tasks;
crimes of danger;
homicide and personal injury: the objective charge of the event; negligence;
corporate criminal liability.
Reference Books
Students should study for the exam by using the following handbook: Blaiotta, Rocco. Diritto Penale e Sicurezza Del Lavoro. Torino: G. Giappichelli, 2023, II ed., only with reference to the following pages: pp. 1-119; 129-134; 147-239; 258-351.
Teaching Methods
Theoretical lessons; case study; practical workshops.
Assessment Method
During the final oral exam, the student will be required to demonstrate the acquisition of the expected learning outcomes showing that he/she knows and understand the notions and principles of labour criminal law and that he/she is able to apply them to pratical cases.
The student is expected also to be able to independently analyse relevant sources and to use the appropriate technical and legal vocabulary, thus proving that he/she has acquired the learning ability for carrying on, also independently, further study of the matter
The following evaluation criteria will be taken into account to assign the final grade, expressed in thirtieths: - knowledge and understanding of labour criminal law and ability to apply them to concrete cases (70%); appropriate use of the technical and legal vocabulary, ability to analyse and evaluate relevant sources (30%).
With regard to this last evaluation criterion, the commitment showed during the practical activities of the course will be taken into account.
Thesis assignment criteria
Interest for the discipline; high grades as a result of the oral exam; attendance of the major in criminal law.
Week 1
Introduction to the course
Intr. Sec. I
Workplace risk assessment and management framework
Topic 1.1 The evolution of the workplace risk assessment and management framework
Topic 1.2 The Consolidated Act for Workplace Safety (amendments of the Law no. 215 of 2021)
Sec. II
Topic 2.1 “Negligence” in labour criminal law.
Topic 2.2 The duty of care.
Topic 2.3 The outsiders.
Topic 2.4. The Viareggio Case
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Pages related to the topics covered in the week: Blaiotta, Rocco. Diritto Penale e Sicurezza Del Lavoro. Torino: G. Giappichelli, 2023: CAP. I.
Week 2
Sec. I
The key figures of the system.
Topic 1.2 Duty of care’s origin and structure. Legal appointment and “de facto” exercise. Article 299 of the T.U.
Topic 1.3 Security policy document, compliance program and corporate organisation.
Topic 1.4 Appointment, delegation of tasks, supervision.
Sec. II
Topic 2.1 The employer and his employees. The architecture of the organisation. The production unit and the multiple employers’ model.
Topic 2.2 The employer and art. 2087 of the civil code.
Topic 2.3 The employer in the private sector.
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Pages related to the topics covered in the week:
Blaiotta, Rocco. Diritto Penale e Sicurezza Del Lavoro. Torino: G. Giappichelli, 2023: CAP. II (pp. 52-57 are not part of the program).
Week 3
Sec. I
The key figures of the system.
Topic 1.1 The obligations of the employer and the director.
Topic 1.2 Risk assessment and drafting of the inherent document.
Topic 1.3 Employees training and information obligations (amendments of the Law no. 215 of 2021)
Topic 1.4 The duty of supervision.
Sec. II
Topic 2.1 The director.
Topic 2.2 The so called “person in charge”.
Topic 2.3 The employee.
Topic 2.4 The prevention and protection service and its manager.
Topic 2.5 The competent doctor.
Topic 2.6 The employees' safety representative.
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Pages related to the topics covered in the week:
Blaiotta, Rocco. Diritto Penale e Sicurezza Del Lavoro. Torino: G. Giappichelli, 2023: CAP. II (pp. 52-57 are not part of the program).
Week 4
Sec. I
Delegation of tasks
Topic 1.1 The delegation of tasks: the different theories.
Topic 1.2 The formal theory.
Topic 1.3 The functional theory.
Topic 1.4 The eclectic theory.
Sec. II
Topic 2.1 The legal framework.
Topic 2.2 The delegator's supervision on the delegate.
Topic 2.3 Supervision and the compliance program to avoid corporate liability.
Sec. III
Topic 3.1 The “sub-delegation”.
Case study and class discussion with exercises.
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Pages related to the topics covered in the week:
Blaiotta, Rocco. Diritto Penale e Sicurezza Del Lavoro. Torino: G. Giappichelli, 2023: CAP. III
Week 5
Sec. I
Precautionary measures framework
Topic 1.1 A general overview of the measures. Standardisation and self-regulation.
Topic 1.2 Risk assessment and drafting of the inherent document.
Topic 1.3 Procurement and the “interferential” risk.
Topic 1.4 The organizational model between corporate compliance, corporate liability and the preventive legal framework.
Sec. II
Topic 2.1 The limits of the precautionary obligation.
Topic 2.2 Constitutional case-law: judgement n. 312 of 1996.
Topic 2.3 The ILVA case-law.
Topic 2.3 The doctrinal debate.
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Pages related to the topics covered in the week:
Blaiotta, Rocco. Diritto Penale e Sicurezza Del Lavoro. Torino: G. Giappichelli, 2023: CAP. IV (pp. 119-129 are not part of the program).
Week 6
Practical exercise on drafting an opinion and a judicial decision in the subjects covered by the course.
Seminar on research methodologies and presentation of the results of studies in the subjects covered by the course
Week 7
Sec. I
Crimes of danger (overview of the misdemeanors)
Topic 1.1 Article 437 of the penal code.
Topic 1.2 The disaster.
Topic 1.3 Injury and injury-illness.
Topic 1.4 The relationship between art. 437 and art. 449 of the penal code.
Topic 1.5. The Eternit Case
Sec. II
Topic 2.1 Art. 451 of the penal code.
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Pages related to the topics covered in the week:
Blaiotta, Rocco. Diritto Penale e Sicurezza Del Lavoro. Torino: G. Giappichelli, 2023: CAP. VI.
Week 8
Sec. I
Homicide and personal injuries
Topic 1.1 Crimes of harm in labour criminal law.
Topic 1.2 The offences and the aggravating circumstances.
Sec. II
Topic 2.1 Logical causal relationship, legal causal relationship, the so called objective attribution of the criminal event.
Topic 2.2 The condicio sine qua non theory.
Topic 2.3 The objections to the sine qua non theory and the theories that have limited its scope: “adequate causality” and “human causality”.
Self-assessment quiz
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Pages related to the topics covered in the week:
Blaiotta, Rocco. Diritto Penale e Sicurezza Del Lavoro. Torino: G. Giappichelli, 2023: CAP. VII (pp. 239-258 are not part of the program).
Week 9
Sec. I
Homicide and personal injuries
Topic 1.1 Risk’s theory.
Topic 1.2 The first root: the creation of the danger
Topic 1.3 The second root: the materialisation of the risk.
Topic 1.4 The principle of competence: the distinction between spheres of risk and spheres of liability.
Topic 1.4 The breaking of the causal relationship due to a new or abnormal risk.
Sec. II
Topic 2.1 The causal relationship in art. 40.2 of the penal code
Topic 2.2 The Franzese judgment.
Student’s presentations
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Pages related to the topics covered in the week:
Blaiotta, Rocco. Diritto Penale e Sicurezza Del Lavoro. Torino: G. Giappichelli, 2023: CAP. VII (pp. 239-258 are not part of the program).
Week 10
Sec. I
Homicide and personal injuries
Topic 1.1 The ThyssenKrupp judgement.
Intr. Section II
Topic 2.1 Case law on scientific evidence: the Cozzini judgement.
Topic 2.2 The causal relationship in case of exposure to harmful substances.
Topic 2.3 Multifactorial pathologies.
Topic 2.4 The question of “cumulative” causal relationship.
Student’s presentations
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Pages related to the topics covered in the week:
Blaiotta, Rocco. Diritto Penale e Sicurezza Del Lavoro. Torino: G. Giappichelli, 2023: CAP. VII (pp. 239-258 are not part of the program).
Week 11
Sec. I
Homicide and personal injuries
Topic 1.1 Negligence and art. 2087 c.c.
Topic 1.2 Event predictability and avoidance. The identification of the precautionary rule and the causal relationship with the event.
Topic 1.3 The “model agent” and the liability without negligence.
Sec. II
Topic 2.1 Predictability, avoidance, “tolerable risk”.
Topic 2.2 Negligence and the precautionary principle.
Topic 2.3 The so called “relational negligence”.
ThyssenKrupp Case
Topic 2.4 Employer's negligence and employee's negligence.
Topic 2.5 Negligent cooperation.
Topic 2.6 Negligence and trust.
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Pages related to the topics covered in the week:
Blaiotta, Rocco. Diritto Penale e Sicurezza Del Lavoro. Torino: G. Giappichelli, 2023: CAP. VII (pp. 239-258 are not part of the program).
Week 12
Final classroom practical exercise on the drafting of a short opinion on one of the course topics.
Corporate criminal liability and labour law. Concluding remarks
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Pages related to the topics covered in the week:
Blaiotta, Rocco. Diritto Penale e Sicurezza Del Lavoro. Torino: G. Giappichelli, 2023: CAP. VII (pp. 351-403 are not part of the program).