Giovanni Maria Flick

 

He raised in a family of Catholic traditions, his father was of German origin, he was fifth of seven children, he studied at the Social Institute, the school of Jesuit Fathers in Turin. Registered at the Catholic University of the Sacred Heart in Milan in 1958, he won a scholarship that allowed him to study at the Augustinianum College. In his youth, he played in the Fuci. After graduating in law, in 1962, he won the competition to enter the judiciary.

From 1964 to 1975 he was magistrate at the court of Rome, both as a judge and as a public prosecutor. In recent years he has taught as a professor in charge of institutions of law and criminal procedure at the University of Perugia and as a professor in charge of criminal law at the University of Messina. In 1980 he became Professor of Criminal Law at Luiss and began to work as a criminal lawyer. He has also worked as a columnist for Il Sole 24 Ore and La Stampa.

In 1996 he was appointed Minister of Grace and Justice of the Government led by Romano Prodi. Following a parliamentary vote, the prisons of Pianosa and Asinara are closed by decree, where many “mafiosi” are unable to communicate from outside the area. The same year in Parliament a series of organic laws reforming the judicial system that will be approved almost entirely, in a process that will end at the end of 1999. Among these is the establishment of a single judge for offenses of minor entity that before they required the use of three magistrates, launched with the intent of meeting the problem of the slowness of Italian court proceedings.

During his term as Minister of grace and justice, the military trial took place in Rome against former SS officer Erich Priebke. When Priebke was acquitted by prescription the relatives of the victims of the Fosse Ardeatine rebelled together with the Jewish community of Rome forcing the judges to remain besieged in court until late at night.

The conclusion of the military process, however, started moving the ordinary criminal trial and, with it, the request for extradition by Germany and the consequent precautionary custody in prison, validated by Minister Flick himself.

On 29 May 1998 the Chamber rejected a motion of no confidence presented by the oppositions against him and the then Minister of the Interior Giorgio Napolitano on charges of not having taken adequate measures to prevent the absconding of Licio Gelli with 46 yes and 310 no.

After his experience as a minister, he was chosen by the D’Alema first government as an Italian representative in the European Human Rights Commission. On February 14, 2000, he was appointed a judge of the Constitutional Court by the President of the Republic, Carlo Azeglio Ciampi; he swore on February 18th. On November 17, 2005, he was appointed Vice President of the Court by the newly elected president Annibale Marini and confirmed in office on July 11, 2006, by the newly elected president Franco Bile. On November 14, 2008, he was elected 32nd president of the Constitutional Court. He left office on February 18th, 2009.

From 18 January 2012, he is the new president of the board of directors of the Centro San Raffaele Foundation of Monte Tabor, succeeding to Don Luigi Maria Verzé.

On 27 April 2012, following the votes of the students of all the Italian Law Faculties, he received the 2012 Jurist Award of the Year from ELSA Italia (The European Law Students’ Association – Italy). She was then chosen as a delegate of the Mayor of Milan Giuliano Pisapia, free of charge, at the Coordination Table for Expo 2015.

On October 31, 2012, he was appointed to the board of directors of the University of Genoa.

In January 2013 he decides to enter politics with the Democratic Center of Bruno Tabacci and is a candidate in the Senate in Piedmont and Lazio in view of the elections on 24 and 25 February.

On January 14, 2013, he expended himself from the role of guarantor to run for elections on the Democratic Center lists.

On 24 January 2013, the Economics Department of the University of Genoa awarded him an honorary degree in Economics and Financial Institutions.