Crime and how it is dealt with can say a lot about a society. As the ways crimes are reported, investigated, prosecuted, remembered, as well as what is considered criminal behavior to begin with - and how laws concerning crime are generated, - all show the character of a culture, so too, do the participants. Both the actors, perpetrators, victims, detectives, reporters, legislators, lawyers as well as the spectators. The drama of a mystery or the court case, TV shows and serials in literature fill up the airwaves, magazine racks and bookshelves in literate, cine-video and digital cultures.
Today, in the US, in particular, today's sentencing for Ariel Castro in Cleveland, OH drew widespread attention. He got 'life plus a thousand years' for 936 crimes he pled guilty to.
Sentencing continued for Bradley Manning at Ft Meade, MD, after the court returned to a 'closed session', meaning the press is banned from its proceedings. Testimony allowed by this military court, in this case is classified and thereby judged free from scrutiny of the press.
Edward Snowden was granted a year long amnesty in Russia today despite the extreme disappointment expressed by the POTUS Press Secretary Jay Carney. Snowden is wanted by the US Government for leaking secret programs of the NSA and the consequent vast global electronic surveillance series of systems that have operated for at least ten years and which have remained very much a secret until this summer.
People continued to gawk and squawk about Anthony Weiner and a San Diego mayor of worse behavior. All week. Crowds still enjoy pointing and shaming and laughing, or commiserating, identifying, going through the stages of grief.
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For a city of its size, Venice had its share of criminal activity. Crimes were judged by their severity and also, it seems by the class of the criminal themselves. Crimes committed by elite members of society could be dealt with very differently than crimes by other sorts of people. Sometimes it seemed expedient to set an example by doling out harsh punishments and sometimes certain crimes seemed to be overlooked. I'll give three different examples in the coming week with more coming later this month and still more scattered through the year. Descriptions of the criminal and the criminal acts, as in this following case, clearly lead an audience to a presumption of guilt before hearing specifics. But then, what the Quarantia Criminal decided on, when they decided it, as well as the Collegio, was good enough for Sanudo. His inquiry doesn't go beyond what was reported or what he himself could see. Gossip then, which he likes to discount, as well as repeat, was common as crime was for his, as well as our own times.
Sanudo Diaries: August 1, 1513 (16:579); "This morning in the Quarantia Criminal the proposal of ser Zuan Capelo, state attorney, and his colleagues was accepted. That is, tomorrow a certain Gasparo d'Arquà will be quartered. This man, using the pretext that he had a trembling disease in his head, made certain very ugly movements, twisting his head backward, and thus he went begging for alms."
This 'pretext' for Sanudo neither reveals nor conceals the factual merits of the accused's 'trembling disease in his head'. But his choice in words reveal what he believes. He continues:
"More than a year ago he found a traffic for himself: he brought many wet nurses and women from the country here and [took] others from this city out [to the country]. Once they were on the road, he took them into a certain wood and assaulted them and took their possessions and the money that they had on them, threatening to kill them. Then he would leave, and the poor women who had been shamed and who had lost their belongings were left there. He did this to more than eighty of them, including eleven maidens, whom he raped; the number from this city [whom he attacked] was sixteen, as is noted in the trial records. He was recognized in the street at San Fantin by one of these women, who said to him, "You assassin, here you are." She grabbed him and turned him over to the officials. It was decided that he be held in the custody of the Forty, and he made a full confession." [pp. 130-31]
A serial rapist and thief, discovered and apprehended by one of his own victims!
"His sentence was to be taken along the Grand Canal on a barge, as is customary, tomorrow at none. Then he will be disembarked at Santa Croce and dragged from a horse's tail [a coda di cavallo] to Piazza San Marco, where his head will be cut off and he will be quartered, with the quarters hung on the gallows, etc."
The Editors point out this dragging could have been literal, in which case it would be difficult for a horse to traverse all the bridges it would require to cross, in Venice, or the phrase could just mean he was handled roughly during the executing of the sentence. Dragging the convict through the streets and down the canal, beheading, quartering and hanging the remains on the gallows was typical for extreme crimes. Some of which was also used for at least one case of witchcraft eight years later.
Sanudo points out that the man convicted was executed a couple days later after pleading for privileges to do 'that thing' one more time. Also, the Venetian Sate Archives identify this man as a former vice-vicar of Arquà, a municipality south and west of Padua and Venice.
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All quotes as Sanudo Diaries or Editor's notes or Editor's Footnotes from Venice, Cita Excellentissima, Selection from the Renaissance Diaries of Marin Sanudo translated by Linda L Carroll, editors: Patricia H LaBalme and Laura Sanguineti White, published by Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008
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