Friday, October 26, 2012

Berlusconi Gets 4-Year Sentence for Tax Evasion

By RACHEL DONADIO
Published: October 26, 2012

ROME — Two days after former Prime MinisterSilvio Berlusconi announced that he would not lead his party in Italy’s next elections, a court in Milan sentenced him on Friday to nearly four years in prison on charges of tax fraud in a case involving television rights.



Tony Gentile/Reuters
Silvio Berlusconi

Although the ruling was Mr. Berlusconi’s fourth lower-court conviction, it was his first since he stepped down as prime minister in November 2011, after years in which his personal legal battles often eclipsed the work of his government.

The symbolism of ruling — a clear blow against Mr. Berlusconi — also comes at a time when his center-right party is unraveling and Italy is in the throes of the most dramatic political transition since the one in the early 1990s in which he first came to power.

A lawyer for Mr. Berusconi said the former prime minister would appeal the ruling, which must go through two more rounds of appeal before becoming definitive. It is unlikely that he will ever serve jail time. Even if a definitive ruling were reached before the statute of limitations in the case runs out next year, Mr. Berlusconi would most likely still have parliamentary immunity.

On Wednesday, Mr. Berlusconi, 76, called for the first primaries of his People of Liberty party, or P.D.L., and said that he would not lead it in Italy’s national elections next spring to replace the unelected technocratic government of Prime Minister Mario Monti, who has been guiding Italy through a perilous economic crisis. But he said that he would stay involved in politics, and that he would most likely remain a member of Parliament.

The investigation at the heart of Friday’s ruling centered on television and movie rights that Mr. Berlusconi’s Fininvest holding company bought in the 1990s via offshore companies from companies in the United States.

Judges said that Mr. Berlusconi and other executives of his Mediaset business empire were accused of inflating the price of television rights for American programs via a series of offshore companies, and funneling the overflow into a series of illegal slush funds.

The court on Friday acquitted the chairman of Mediaset, Fedele Confalonieri, a longtime Berlusconi loyalist.

Judges also banned the former prime minister from holding public office for five years, a penalty that would be applied only if, and after, a ruling against by the highest court were reached.

On Friday, judges read not only the sentence against Mr. Berlusconi but also the reasoning behind it, a step that normally takes between 60 and 90 days after a ruling. That could speed up the appeals process, making a high court ruling possible before the statute of limitations in the case runs out next year.

“If the sentence is confirmed before the statute of limitations runs out, he has to leave Parliament,” said Marco Travaglio, a journalist who has chronicled all of Mr. Berlusconi’s trials.

A lawyer for Mr. Berusconi, Piersilvio Cipollotti, said that the former prime minister would appeal the ruling.

Mr. Berlusconi, who owns Italy’s largest private broadcaster, Mediaset, as well as major holdings in real estate, insurance, advertising and publishing, has been involved in dozens of legal cases over the years.

A trial over accusations that Mr. Berlusconi paid for sex with an underage prostitute is currently being heard in Milan. He has denied all charges against him.

Between 1997 and 1998, when Mr. Berlusconi was the opposition leader, he was convicted by lower courts on charges of tax fraud and corruption.

In one case, known as All Iberian, prosecutors said Mr. Berlusconi and his associates used offshore accounts to illegally finance Italy’s former socialist party leader, Bettino Craxi, who was Mr. Berlusconi’s former political patron.

All three previous lower court convictions were either overturned on appeal or thrown out for lack of evidence — or the statute of limitations ran out before a definitive highest court ruling was reached.

In 2009, a Milan court sentenced the British lawyer David Mills, who has helped Mr. Berlusconi’s company set up the offshore accounts, for taking almost $600,000 in exchange for providing favorable testimony in two trials against Mr. Berlusconi.

The ruling was upheld on appeal, but in 2010, Italy’s highest courtthrew out the case after the statute of limitations ran out.


Gaia Pianigiani contributed reporting.



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1 comment:

Arsenio A. Lembert Jr. said...

Not for nothing, amici:

Dov'è il privilegio esecutivo?