Cruise captain to go on trial for manslaughter over shipwreck

Francesco Schettino will be the only defendant in the trial, which begins on July 9 in the Tuscan town of Grosseto, a judge has decided.

Five other defendants successfully sought plea bargains in their cases, which are now being handled separately.

Schettino is charged with manslaughter, causing a shipwreck and abandoning the ship while many of the 4,200 passengers and crew were still aboard. He denies the charges.

The Concordia ran aground off the tiny island of Giglio.

Schettino’s lawyer says he faces as much as 20 years in prison if convicted.

Schettino says he is innocent and is being made a scapegoat, insisting that the reef was not marked on the ship’s navigational charts. He has also depicted himself as a hero in the tragedy, saying that he skilfully steered the stricken ship closer to Giglio’s harbour, helping the rescue of survivors.

His lawyer, Francesco Pepe, said the judge rejected the defence’s request to throw out the charge of abandoning the ship. The judge last week rejected Schettino’s plea-bargain bid, which would have drastically reduced his sentence in case of a conviction.

The disgraced captain attended the hearing but made no comment afterwards.

“Schettino is calm,” his lawyer said. “The decision today isn’t a judgement on merits. The judge only evaluated whether the appropriate place for all the charges to be decided is a trial.”

Court-appointed experts have pinned the blame for the shipwreck on Schettino, but they also concluded that the crew and Costa Crociere, a unit of Miami-based Carnival, committed blunders and safety breaches that contributed to the disaster.

The experts have concluded that crew members did not have proper training or certification in safety and emergency drills, and that Costa had delayed alerting coastal authorities about the accident, which Costa has denied.

The findings by the experts, along with descriptions by survivors, are expected to be at the heart of the prosecution’s case.

The Concordia still lies in the water on its side outside Giglio’s harbour as a sophistical removal plan has fallen far behind schedule. Experts had promised to have the wreck removed before the start of the island’s summer tourist season.

The bodies of two of the 32 victims were never found.