Giovanni Castellucci, former head of Italy’s motorway operator, just got slapped with a 12-year sentence due to the catastrophic 2018 bridge collapse. And let’s not kid ourselves; mainstream media outlets like CNN and the BBC are running this story with a predictable narrative. They’re focusing on the failure of an individual—Castellucci—while conveniently skirting the bigger picture: a systemic failure in corporate governance and infrastructure oversight.

These outlets are framing Castellucci as the lone villain in a tragedy that cost lives, without digging deeper into the complicity of the entire system. It’s classic deflection. CNN spins it as if scrapping a single CEO will solve the widespread issues of safety and accountability in Italy’s sprawling infrastructure. Meanwhile, Fox News might counter by casting the narrative in terms of government failures, but neither is attacking the root causes that allowed this disaster to happen in the first place.

What does this tell us? The narrative is tailored to distract you from asking the tough questions: How many other executives are skirting accountability? What about the regulations that failed? The corporate media talk a lot about justice, but the real crime here is the avoidance of responsibility on a corporate and governmental level.

If we’re going to reflect on such tragedies, let’s make sure the conversation isn’t confined to just scapegoats. We need to hold the entire ecosystem accountable, not just the ones at the top who can be easily sacrificed for PR purposes.