A top aide of former foreign minister Gianfranco Fini denied on Wednesday that he helped aspiring showgirls find jobs at state broadcaster RAI in return for sex. Fini spokesman Salvatore Sottile was placed under house arrest last Friday as part of a prostitution and corruption probe which also landed Prince Vittorio Emanuele of Savoy behind bars.
The main charge against Sottile is that he had sexual relations with showgirl Elisabetta Gregoraci in return for helping her career along at RAI. Prosecutors say the Sicilian spokesman used rooms at the Foreign Ministry and the premier's office for his assignations.
He is also accused of corruption in connection with a scheme to supply rigged gambling machines to casinos and bars in Italy and abroad. The allegations have shaken the rightist National Alliance (AN) party which Fini heads and which is the second biggest in the Silvio Berlusconi-led opposition.
Sottile was questioned by investigating magistrates in the southern city of Potenza for several hours on Wednesday. According to Sottile's lawyer, the spokesman denied having sexual relations with Gregoraci and insisted she was just a friend.
Sottile admitted that Gregoraci had visited him at the Foreign Ministry but only as a friend, the lawyer said. He said that published transcripts of taped conversations which suggested Sottile had had sex with the showgirl were merely a case of empty male "bragging".
Sottile also denied the corruption charges. Prosecutors suspect Sottile of acting as an intermediary with state monopolies' agency officials who were allegedly bribed to supply permits for the rigged gambling machines. The spokesman told investigators that he obtained the name of the director general of the state monopolies' agency, Giorgio Tino, from AN Senator Francesco Proietti Cosimi and passed it on to a Rome accountant. He said no wrongdoing was involved.
Cosimi and Tino, together with another agency official, Anna Maria Lucia Barbarito, are all under investigation in the case.
Tino and Barbarito are suspected of accepting bribes in exchange for permits for the video poker machines. Sottile's lawyer Emilio Nicola Buccico said that Sottile had "explained everything about his relations with the people involved (in the investigation). His testimony was clear, consistent and exhaustive".
He also said he had asked for Sottile's release from house arrest. Sottile and Prince Vittorio Emanuele of Savoy, the son
of Italy's last king, were arrested five days ago together with 11 other suspects in a probe led by Potenza prosecutors.
Vittorio Emanuele, 69, is accused of recruiting prostitutes from Eastern Europe for a casino in Campione d'Italia, an Italian enclave in Switzerland. He is also accused of corruption in connection with the obtaining of licences and supply contracts for the illegal gambling machines procured by a Sicilian businessman, Rocco Migliardi.
The prince, who denies all wrongdoing, is accused of using his high-level contacts to help sell the video poker games to the Campione casino and countries including Libya. Prosecutors also suspect him of links with Mafia clans. Migliardi was also arrested on Friday together with the mayor of Campione d'Italia, Roberto Salmoiraghi; Gian Nicolino Narducci, the prince's secretary, and Venetian businessman Ugo Bonazza. Migliardi and Narducci are being held in the same cell as the prince.
Two others, businessman Achille De Luca and alleged conman Massimo Pizza, were already in jail in Potenza in connection with the probe.
Another 24 people are under investigation for possible crimes ranging from corruption, extortion and money laundering to blackmail and the aiding and abetting of alleged criminal activity.
