Jacques Moretti, the owner of the Constellation, arrested in Switzerland for the New Year's Eve massacre in Crans Montana, reportedly made important admissions to prosecutors . This is a sign of the "spirit of cooperation" he had promised, and his lawyers believe this should rule out the risk of his escape that landed him in prison, but also a risk of his situation worsening.
According to Swiss television RTS, Moretti confirmed that on the very night of the New Year's Eve fire, the service door on the ground floor of the building was locked from the inside. He also confirmed that he himself replaced the (flammable) sound-absorbing foam that caught fire . He admitted that the staff was "inexperienced" and that "it wasn't the first time" candles had been lit in the basement .
Crans-Montana: autopsie per Galeppini, Barosi e Costanzo. Riesumata la salma di Tamburi
The investigation by the Public Prosecutor's Office of the Canton of Valais into the massacre that left 40 dead (6 Italians) and 116 injured (16 Italians) has been extended to the municipal administration of Crans Montana.
Over the past five years, the municipality has failed to carry out the necessary safety checks , as Mayor Nicolas Féraud himself admitted. Investigators are also scrutinizing the division of responsibility between the municipality itself and the Canton of Valais, which has legislative jurisdiction over fire protection.
Nicole Bonvin Clivaz, a hotelier and deputy mayor of the town, confirms that a lively exchange of documents and information has developed in the last few hours between the Crans-Montana municipality and the Sion Public Prosecutor's Office. She admits the administration's failings: " There was a failure to carry out checks," she says. "We admitted we didn't do them, and we take responsibility for this failure . But the investigation will tell; we don't have the real answers yet."
According to the number two at the ski resort, "the investigation will take a long time. There's still a lot to find and say. We've now recovered everything from the archives and tried to understand as best we could. We've handed over all the documents. We must understand that in just a few hours we had to reconstruct 60 years of history, and I believe we've done it seriously and with a desire for transparency."
Bonvin Clivaz's statements attempt to address the controversy surrounding last Wednesday's press conference by Mayor Féraud, who came under fire for failing to apologize to the victims . "There's no excuse for not apologizing," the deputy admits. "When you're in the line of fire, you can sometimes be clumsy, but today we have to do so: we stand with the families, we stand with the victims, these people who are suffering."
(Unioneonline)