Bari appeal court annuls ADM €20k fine over online gambling computers

The Bari Court of Appeal annulled a €20,000 fine imposed by the Agenzia delle Dogane e dei Monopoli (ADM) on the owner of a commercial premises for making personal computers available to customers for access to online gambling platforms. The court's First Civil Section upheld the owner's appeal, assisted by lawyer Mariateresa Parrelli, and set aside the earlier decision of the Tribunale di Bari.

The case dates to a 2016 police check, during which nine internet-connected computer stations were identified and a customer was found playing on an online platform with money winnings. ADM contested a breach of article 7, paragraph 3-quater, of decree law 158/2012 (the Balduzzi decree) and applied the €20,000 administrative fine by injunction order of 7 March 2017. The Tribunale di Bari confirmed the measure in 2023, rejecting the owner's opposition.

The Court of Appeal reversed that decision in light of Constitutional Court ruling 104/2025, which declared unlawful the Balduzzi decree's ban insofar as it sanctioned the mere provision of equipment suitable for connecting to gambling sites, and also censured the related sanctions regime in the 2016 Stability Law. According to the constitutional judges, the rules pursued the legitimate aim of countering gambling addiction but treated markedly different conduct alike, without distinguishing between access to legal and illegal gambling, occasional use of the equipment and its exclusive and permanent dedication to gambling.

The Constitutional Court found the provision grouped widely differing conduct under the same assessment of unlawfulness, and that the ban affected occasional and exclusive permanent dedication of equipment alike, making it excessively inclusive relative to its aims. It also found the regime disproportionate with respect to freedom of enterprise, citing modest effectiveness against gambling addiction against a significant and immediate compression of opposing interests, including freedom of economic initiative. The Bari judges reiterated that the ban, in its indiscriminate extension, unreasonably and disproportionately sacrificed other opposing interests, including freedom of enterprise.

A central aspect concerned the distinction between ordinary personal computers used for internet browsing and equipment permanently used for gambling. The decision noted that the legislator provided identical treatment without distinguishing between equipment permanently dedicated to gambling and tools with an ordinary internet browsing function, in conflict with the constitutional principles of reasonableness and proportionality.

The retroactive effect of the declaration of constitutional illegitimacy, applicable to all legal relationships not yet final, was decisive for the outcome. The Court of Appeal stated that the declaration of illegitimacy of article 7, paragraph 3-quater, affected the very basis of the administrative offence contested in the proceedings, and that because the sanction was still subject to judicial challenge, the challenged injunction order lacked the necessary legal premise and could not be maintained. The panel upheld the appeal, annulled ADM's sanctioning measure and ordered compensation of costs in both instances in view of the supervening Constitutional Court ruling.