[1] Before the armistice, suspects about "traitors" in the naval staff were aroused by the interception of many supply convoys bound for North Africa, which occurred with such precision that it seemed as if the Allies knew about their time schedule.
Leonardi was accused of surrendering the heavily defended naval fortress area of Augusta and Syracuse without fighting, during the Allied invasion of Sicily (in reality, the defence of Augusta had collapsed due to the weakness of the inland defences and the mass desertion of the MILMART personnel, and Leonardi had tried to mount a defense with the few troops that were still available and even personally fired on British ships from a deserted coastal battery).
Campioni, Mascherpa, Matteucci and Zannoni were accused of obeying the "traitorous" Badoglio government and resisting the Germans after the armistice of Cassibile on 8 September 1943.
The investigation was carried out hastily and almost without looking for evidence; lawyer Gustavo Ghidini, who defended Campioni, complained that the trial "in reality does not exist: it absolutely lacks a legal basis, it is illogical, absurd", and lawyer Paolo Toffanin, who defended Mascherpa, demonstrated that the admiral could not have abstained from carrying out the orders received from the Supreme Command, later confirmed by Campioni, to whom he was directly subordinated; he was a sailor who had been serving for two years on the remote island of Leros, unaware of all the political troubles of the capital, and as such he had to obey the orders of the king and the governments in office.
The defense had summoned ten witnesses, but only three showed up in the courtroom; the lawyers then asked for the trial to be postponed, but the president, Blackshirt General Giuseppe Griffini, replied that he did not see the reason and immediately gave the floor to the Public Prosecutor, who began his indictment.