An court in the northwestern city of Turin on Monday acquitted an Italian writer of instigating criminal damage to a controversial high-speed rail link across the Alps.
Supporters of 65-year-old Erri De Luca broke into wild cheers at judge Immacolata Iadeluca's not-guilty verdict.
De Luca hailed the verdict as a victory for free speech. "An injustice has been averted," he said, adding that the Turin court was "an outpost of the near future" that had championed free speech.
Before the verdict, De Luca said he was willing to be jailed for the principles at stake and said he stood by comments he made in 2013 that "every action" against the project to build a high-speed rail link between Turin and Lyon was "legitimate" and "just".
Prosecutors asked for an eight-month jail sentence for De Luca, arguing that his international fame made it likely that his stance would encourage militants to act.
Turin prosecutor Antonio Rinaudo said there had been numerous attacks on the site of the 26 billion euro high-speed rail link, particularly after the writer's interviews with Italian media in September 2013.
Opponents of the rail link, who include residents, environmentalists and anti-globalisation protesters, say it will destroy Italy's pristine Val di Susa and the tunnelling could release toxic asbestos particles into the atmosphere.
LTF, the Franco-Italian consortium building the train link brought the prosecution against De Luca. Drilling work began in 2013 for the project, which has strong support from the Italian and French governments.
A lifelong radical and ex-militant from a 1970s far-left group, De Luca's literary work centres on his home city of Naples and has been translated into English, French, German, Spanish and a number of other languages.
