On 27 February 2025, Agenparl, a national and international press agency, made a claim for damages against the Grande Oriente d’Italia (GOI) for defamation in the press. The dispute, submitted to a mediation body in Rome, stems from the failure to rectify a GOI press release, deemed defamatory by Agenparl. The matter will be discussed on 31 March.

The clash stems from an article on Leo Taroni.

On 16 December 2024, the Grand Master of the GOI, Stefano Bisi, published a communiqué on the official website of the Grand Orient of Italy – Palazzo Giustiniani in which he contested an article published by Agenparl on 14 December 2024, entitled: ‘The Grand Orient of Italy: Leo Taroni is the new Grand Master’.

According to the GOI, the article was damaging and distorted reality, helping to fuel the controversy over certain ongoing judicial events.

In his statement, Bisi said that the GOI considered itself damaged by the dissemination of erroneous and misleading information and requested a correction, reserving the possibility of legal action against Agenparl. The statement was also disseminated on the X platform (formerly Twitter) on the same date.

The right of rectification and the GOI’s refusal.

Agenparl, citing Article 8 of the press law, immediately requested an immediate rectification of the GOI’s press release, stressing that it had limited itself to faithfully reporting the official position of the GOI, as expressed by lawyer Raffaele Cappiello, special curator of the Order.

According to Agenparl, its article did not anticipate any judicial outcome and was based on accurate and verified documentation.

However, the GOI refused to publish the correction, keeping the disputed statement online. This behaviour led Agenparl to claim damages, arguing that the failure to correct severely damaged its reputation and credibility.

A claim for compensation with a sympathetic asset.

Agenparl, together with its director Luigi Camilloni, stated that the GOI’s refusal had a detrimental effect on the agency’s image. For this reason, it has filed a claim for damages, proposing that the amount also be allocated to an orphanage in Rome.

Agenparl’s lawyer, Francesco Lorenti, pointed out that the permanence of the defamatory statement online continues to damage the agency’s reputation. The request for compensation, therefore, is seen as a necessity to restore professional decorum.

GOI: strategic attack or simple negligence?

As of today, the Grand Orient of Italy has not set itself up nor has it indicated whether it intends to participate in the mediation requested by Agenparl’s lawyer. This silence raises three questions:

Does the GOI first write posts and issue communiqués on X, then avoid answering because it knows it is wrong?

Did the GOI just do what in Neapolitan is called ‘Facite ammuina’ (make confusion to distract)?

Or, more heavily, has it deliberately tried to damage Agenparl’s image?

Agenparl is waiting for the GOI to join the mediation and give its version of the facts. If the Grand Master is so sure of his statements, why not officially defend them?

The affair could soon become an emblematic case on the responsibility of institutional communication and the use of corrections in the Italian press.