3167 Magicians

This comes from today's Telegraph. Its the last paragraph that gets me.:)

Italy's most famous television saleswoman has been convicted of fraud for selling "miracle" lottery numbers and trinkets to ward off the "evil eye”.

Vanna Marchi, a flamboyant 74-year-old with red hair, and her daughter, Stefania Nobile, were each jailed for two and a half years.

Miss Marchi became well-known in the 1980s, selling beauty lotions and diet elixirs on television. After going bankrupt, she turned to selling "sure-fire" lottery numbers.

A court in Milan heard that she and her accomplices built up a catalogue of 300,000 customers and that the gang had earned around £23 million between 1996 and 2001.

If anyone complained that their numbers had not come up, Miss Marchi would tell them that they had the "evil eye" and offer to remove it for a sizeable fee. Customers were told to dissolve magic salt in water and place it under their beds or to buy protective amulets. Anyone who tried to back out, or failed to pay on time, was threatened with dire consequences.

Almost eight million Italians visit magicians every year, official statistics show. Radio Maria, a Roman Catholic radio programme, estimates that Italy has 40,000 practising magicians.