ESG Enforcement Tracker

Key facts:

In a landmark judgment in June 2025, an Italian court held at first instance that eleven former-executives of Miteni, a chemical company in northeastern Italy, were guilty of polluting water used by hundreds of thousands of people. Four other defendants were acquitted.

The defendants were convicted of contaminating nearly 200 square kilometres of drinking water and soil with per-and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), so-called ‘forever chemicals’, used in everyday goods such as non-stick pans and waterproof jackets. PFAS have now been linked to hormonal disruptions, immune suppression and cancer. The polluting source was the former Trissino chemical plant producing PFAS from 1968 until its closure due to bankruptcy in 2018. During that time, it was run by three companies.

The trial started in 2021, and over 300 civil parties joined the prosecution, including Greenpeace and a group of mothers whose children had traces of chemicals in their blood.

The prison terms ranged from under three years to 17 years, and among those convicted included three former Japanese Mitsubishi board members. The defendants were charged with offences including water poisoning, unspecified environmental disaster, unauthorised waste management, environmental pollution and bankruptcy offences.

The main charge brought by the Vicenza Public Prosecutor’s Office was that of aggravated water poisoning as, according to the prosecutor, the managers “conspired to cause the poisoning of water intended for human consumption.” Miteni, as the party liable civilly, is accused of failing to adopt an organisational model suitable for preventing pollution.

The ruling also awarded compensation to civil parties, with the largest amount awarded to the Italian Ministry of the Environment (58 million euros).

In May, a court ruled that the death of a worker of the chemical plant who died of cancer in 2014 was caused by their prolonged exposure to PFAS.