Italian
At the 3rd Festival of the Whole Human, organized by the Ditelo Sui Tetti network in Rome in June 2026, there was Santo and Francesca Versace, founders of the Santo Versace Foundation, which has been committed for years in Italy and abroad to supporting the most vulnerable people. In this interview on the sidelines of the event, they discuss their projects in Italian prisons and the message they brought to the festival: to restore dignity to those whom punishment risks taking away forever.
ROME. The Santo Versace Foundation operates in Italy and abroad with a clear mission: to be close to the most vulnerable people. One of the most significant areas of intervention concerns the prison system, where the Foundation works to ensure that detention does not reduce to humiliation, but can become — as provided by the Italian Constitution — a real path of rehabilitation and reintegration.
“The Foundation is committed to supporting the most vulnerable,” explained Francesca Versace. “This is a mission we carry out in Italy and abroad. I participated in this festival to talk about our projects on Italian prisons.”
“Hugs in Freedom”: spaces of affection where there was once decay
The flagship project is Hugs in Freedom, a national initiative aimed at renovating the spaces dedicated to meetings between incarcerated parents and their children, with the goal of protecting emotional continuity even during detention. Renewed environments, furnished with games, and well-maintained greenery: places where a child should no longer feel ashamed to visit their parent.
“We have restored dignity to incarcerated parents,” said Francesca Versace, “but we have also helped the children, who no longer have to feel ashamed of a degrading environment that is frightening. Instead, they can feel — and they do, as we have seen — the joy of meeting their parents.”
“We were lucky”: the story that changes perspective
The most intense moment of the interview was the story of a 19-year-old girl met during a visit to prison. Santo Versace spoke about it in a measured voice, but the weight of the words was immediate.
“She is in prison because her parents beat her to force her into prostitution. They tortured her. She ran away and ended up with the baby gangs.” She will be released in a year and a half. “My wife’s concern is that when that girl gets out, she has a point of reference, because she is in prison, but because she has been unfortunate.”
The resulting reflection is simple and powerful: “We have been fortunate. In many cases, incarcerated individuals are in prison because they were born in the wrong place, in the wrong family. We have great fortune and we must know how to deserve it.”
Francesca said: “When my husband was telling that story, I thought: at 19 I was starting my studies in law and I had parents who encouraged me. She didn’t have that. The inmate cannot be just their sentence. They must be a human being.”
The panel on justice: voices from law and experience
The Santo Versace Foundation participated in Step 3 of the festival, the panel dedicated to the theme The Eclipse of Justice, the Last Stronghold Against Interpersonal and Social Conflict, led by Eva Sala (Counselor for the Presidency of Administrative Justice) and Massimiliano Zaniolo (magistrate).
Together with Francesca De Stefano Versace, Vice President of the Santo Versace Foundation, the following participated:
- Antonio Baldassarre, Emeritus President of the Constitutional Court and co-founder of the “civic committees” for a new justice
- Guglielmo Borri, Vice President of MCL and civic committees
- Marco Sorbara, judicial victim
- Domenico Airoma, Prosecutor of Naples North
- Francesco Caringella, President of the Section of the Council of State
- Anna Gallucci, Public Prosecutor of Pesaro
- Francesco Paolo Sisto, Deputy Minister of Justice
The public proposal that emerged from the session was to establish a Justice Against Humanity Observatory, a tool to monitor and report cases where the judicial and penitentiary system ends up harming — rather than protecting — human dignity.
The 3rd Festival of the Whole Human took place on June 16 and 17, 2026, at the Pio Sodalizio dei Piceni, Piazza San Salvatore in Lauro 15, Rome, organized by the Ditelo Sui Tetti network (suitetti.org)
